Empowerment of Common Prosperity through Digital Economy: Pathways and Policy Design

Abstract

China’s entry into common prosperity coincides with digital economy at the same period. As China gradually enters the digital era, the common prosperity is bound to rely on the digital economy, and both have a strong fit. This paper analyzes the realization path of common prosperity from the perspective of digital economy, showing that digital economy can promote not only the general growth of macro economy, namely, “making the cake bigger,” but also regional industrial decentralization, urban and rural coordination and the construction of a unified national market, which is conducive to balanced growth, namely, “dividing the cake.” Moreover, it can make up for the shortage of public services, improve the service capacity of the government, make digital infrastructure more adequate and balanced, and accelerate the equalization of basic public services. Meanwhile, digital economy may also lead to structural unemployment of labor force and other problems. Therefore, it is necessary to maximize its strengths and avoid its weaknesses in policy design so as to achieve the result with less efforts and promote the cause of common prosperity in a sustained and steady way.

Key words： digital economy, common prosperity, general growth, balanced growth, equalization of public service