As a leading force in a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation, artificial intelligence (AI) is bound to have a profound impact on the high-quality development. Based on the panel data of 283 cities in China from 2008 to 2019 and bringing the employment structure of the labor force with different skills into the analytical framework of AI and high-quality development, this paper conducts an empirical study. The findings show that the application of AI can promote the upgrading of urban industrial structure, raise the level of urban technological innovation and green and low carbon, so as to further promote the high-quality development of the cities. From the perspective of the theoretical mechanism, the application of AI can promote high-quality urban development by reducing the employment share of low-skilled labors and increasing the employment share of high-skilled labors. From the perspective of different regions, the application of AI in the eastern region can significantly promote the high-quality development of the cities, and the high-skilled labor force will strengthen the impact of AI on the high-quality development; while the application of AI in the northeast region will significantly inhibit the high-quality development, and the low-skilled labor force will intensify the inhibition of AI on the high-quality development. The above conclusions suggest that the application of AI should be actively promoted to enable the high-quality development. Meanwhile, different regions should formulate differentiated AI development strategies according to the objective realities, such as employment structure and so on.

Digital economy is playing an increasingly prominent role in promoting the economic growth and the changes of quality and efficiency. Based on the establishment of the dynamic theory of the impact of digital economy on urban economic growth, this paper conducts an empirical analysis by making use of the panel data of 254 cities in China from 2011 to 2019. The findings show that the impact of digital economy on economic growth has not only the dynamic effect, but also the spatial spillover effect. The data analysis indicates that the impact of digital economy on urban economic development of different regions has heterogeneity. The spatial spillover effect of the impact of digital economy on economic growth in the neighboring cities at the inter-provincial border is significantly higher than that in neighboring cities within the province, and the spatial spillover effect of digital economy in the neighboring cities in the central and western regions is significantly higher than that in the eastern region. The double difference estimation with the Broadband China as the policy shock further verifies the robustness of the above-mentioned conclusion. This shows that, unlike the traditional economic development modes, the input and accumulation of digital economy can release the constraints of geography and transportation, which will be more conducive to the agglomeration development of urban clusters and the construction of inter-provincial economic zones, especially the economic growth and the regional coordinated development in the central and western regions.

The report of the 20^th Party Congress proposes to continue to deepen the reform of state-owned capital and enterprises. At present, the reform of state-owned capital and enterprises has entered a new stage of taking“capital management”as the principal thing, and it is of great importance to study the effectiveness, mechanism and economic consequences of the reform of state-owned capital investment and operation companies (SOCIOCs). Based on the data of the reform samples of state-owned listed companies from 2008 to 2020, this paper conducts an empirical study. The findings show that the reform of SOCIOCs can significantly improve the investment efficiency of SOEs, which is mainly achieved by inhibiting over-investment. The result of the mechanism analysis shows that there form of SOCIOCs has improved the investment efficiency of SOEs through the two intrinsic mechanisms of curbing the opportunistic behaviors of the management and reducing the policy burdens. Further analysis reveals that the stronger the reform efforts, the stronger the effect of SOEs investment efficiency improvement will be. The effect of SOCIOCs reform on the improvement of the investment efficiency of SOEs is more significant in the group of enterprises with lower levels of corporate governance. The result of the economic consequence test reveals that the financial value of SOEs can be significantly improved when the investment efficiency of SOEs is improved by the SOCIOCs reform. Therefore, we should actively promote the reform of SOCIOCs, promote the reform of government decentralization, give full play to the corporate supervision mechanism, and improve the level of corporate governance.

Under the new development pattern of dual circulation, promoting consumption and expanding domestic demand will play a fundamental role. Tax reduction is an important policy choice to reduce the tax burden on market entities and expand domestic demand. Based on the data of Chinese Household Finance Survey(CHFS), this study uses the evidence from the quasi natural experiment of“replacing business tax with value-added tax”to examine the mechanism and policy effects of tax reduction on the capacity expansion and quality improvement of the consumption of Chinese residents. The results indicate that the“replacement of business tax with value-added tax”has significantly promoted the residents’ consumption and increased the household average consumption propensity and consumption upgrading index, having a capacity expansion and quality improvement effect. Further research has found that“replacing business tax with value-added tax”can stimulate residents’ consumption from both supply and demand sides, following the price mechanism and income mechanism, the consumption upgrading effect of the income mechanism is more sustainable. The consumption effect of the“replacing business tax to value-added tax”policy is heterogeneous among households in different income groups, with a greater impact on the capacity expansion and quality improvement of consumption for low-income households. Therefore, it is suggested to reduce the burden on enterprises, assist residents in employment and in income growth, improve the consumption willingness and the ability of low and middle-income residents, stimulate social consumption potential, promote the equalization and accessibility of basic public services, reduce residents’ motivation for preventive savings, promote the development of modem life service industry, and optimize the supply of development oriented and enjoyment oriented consumption.

Based on the theory of trade competition effect, this paper mainly adopts the matching and merging data of the period of 2002-2013 from China Industrial and Enterprise Database, China Enterprise Patent Database, China Patent Full-text Database(CNKI), China Customs Database, and CEPII-BACI database to investigate the impact of the initial productivity adjustment mechanism of the export market size of China’s general trade enterprises on the quantity and quality of technological innovation, as well as the timing choice of the impact of export market size growth rate on the quantity and quality growth rate of technology innovation. The results show that, on the whole, only when the initial productivity of enterprises exceeds a threshold level can the positive impact of export market size on the quantity and quality of technological innovation appear. In terms of the structure, the enterprises with positive impacts of export market size on the quantity and quality of technological innovation are mainly concentrated around such industries as the chemical raw material and chemical products manufacturing, the medicine manufacturing, the general-purpose equipment manufacturing, the electric machinery and equipment manufacturing, and the computer, communication and other electric equipment manufacturing. In terms of timing, the growth of the quantity and quality of technological innovation of the general trading enterprises occurs in the second year and the third year after the growth of export market size respectively. Therefore, local governments should improve the business environment and reduce taxes and fees for the export enterprises. The export enterprises should improve productivity, reduce costs, expand the size of export markets, and shorten the time for innovation decision-making, so as to let export market size play a positive role in promoting the quantity and quality of innovation.

The internationalization and digitization of RMB is the significant driving force for China’s high-quality economic development, therefore, it has significant theoretical and practical values to study the impact of digital RMB from the perspective of international economy. Based on the dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model of the two countries with the characteristics of the liquidity service and asset service of digital RMB, this paper conducts an analysis of the international economic effect of the issuance and cross-border use of digital RMB. The findings show that the issuance and cross-border use of digital RMB can stabilize domestic economic fluctuations caused by exogenous technical and policy shocks, while strengthening economic and financial ties between China and foreign countries, which is mainly achieved by strengthening the ties between international trade and international finance. The difference in the restrictions on cross-border use of digital RMB has alimited impact on the domestic economy, but has a greater impact on the holdings of digital RMB inforeign countries and the net exports. The stronger the liquidity of digital RMB, the more stable the macroeconomic fluctuation caused by domestic shocks will be, but it may exacerbate international economic fluctuations. The above conclusions suggest that the People’s Bank of China can promote the pilots of cross-border use of digital RMB in a step-by-step and orderly manner, and pay attention to the dynamic adjustment of the cross-border use restrictions and the coordination of international economic policies.

The Chinese style modernization is inseparable from the high-quality development of private economy. Being an important part of the private economy, family enterprises are faced with the problem of long-term insufficient innovation input. Under the background of innovation-driven development in China, it is of great significance to improve the innovation level of family firms. The existing studies usually treat family firms as individuals that make independent decisions,ignoring the influence from other firms. Based on the theories of social psychology and socioemotional wealth, this article discusses the influence of peer firms on the innovation investment of family firms, which can provide a new perspective to solve the problem of insufficient innovation investment of family enterprises. The results show that peer firms have a significant promoting effect on the innovation investments of family firms, and that the information acquisition imitation is the main internal mechanism. While the competitive imitation has no significant effect,which indicates that the essence of that peer effect is to reduce risk rather than increase returns. Both the firms and environment characteristics have heterogeneous influence on the above effects. When the equity restriction degree inside of the companies is weaker, or the company is in recession, or the economic policy uncertainty outside of the company is greater, or the company is located in the eastern region, the peer effect of innovation investment of family firms is more remarkable.

Taking the green finance reform and innovation pilot zones set up in 2017 as a quasi-natural experiment,this paper uses the green patent data of the Shanghai and Shenzhen A-share listed companies in the heavily polluting industries in China from 2014 to 2020 to explore the impact of the green finance pilot policy on the corporate green innovations with the double difference method. The findings show that the green finance pilot policy is conducive to improving the green innovation activity of the enterprises. For enterprises with higher pollution emission intensity, the green innovation incentive effect of the policy is more obvious. Corporate reputation risk and financing convenience are the two important channels for the policy to improve the activity of green innovation ofenterprises. The above conclusions are more significant in the samples of non-state-owned enterprises, with higher degree of dependence on external financing and with weaker environmental regulations. This research conclusion not only provides empirical evidences for the implementation effect of thegreen finance pilot policy,but also has practical significance for improving the green finance system and replicating and promoting the green finance reform and innovation pilot zones.

Green innovative enterprises often fall into the“green trap”, but the existing research literatures seldom pay attention to how to break out of the“green trap”. Therefore, taking 206 manufacturing enterprises in the eastern coastal area as samples, this paper constructs a mechanism model of the impact of green innovation on enterprise performance by combining the serendipity and the green legitimacy. Then it analyzes the adjusting role of the orientation of means in it. The findings show that green innovation has no direct impact on corporate performance, but it can indirectly exert a positive effect on corporate performance by promoting serendipity. The orientation of means plays a positive moderating role between green innovation and serendipity. Under the effect of green legitimacy, green innovation can bring about the improvement of corporate performance. This research conclusion can promote the development of the serendipity theory in China, and provides important enlightenment on how companies can break out of the “green trap”.

At present, the problems of poor audit quality and vicious competition by lower audit charges are becoming extremely serious. The main reasons lie in the attributes of social audit products, the particularity of audit market and the CPAs’ finding business by their social relationships. The social audit attestation business has the attribute of public goods, which are easy to cause market failure and social hazard. Therefore, it is necessary for the government to govern the above problems. The tool of governance used by government is to make use of the concept of regulation to build an open, transparent, centralized and shared social audit regulation platform integrating the five aspects of“industry, price, quality, credit and payment”. This platform should be based on the sharing of big data information, form a price mechanism jointly participated by multi-agents, and adopt a diversified price supervision mechanism, so as to curb illicit competition at lower prices. It is necessary to rely on this platform to establish a quality incentive mechanism and construct a classified credit evaluation system, so as to improve audit quality and standardize audit charges. It is necessary to rely on this platform to create a “entrusted payment mode on the regulated platform”, cut off the benefit chain of“power rental”and“commission rebate”generated by“monopolizing business by social relationships”and“putting in storage by selection”, and weaken the management’s control on price, selection and payment, so as to maintain the independence of certified public accountants and curb illicit competition in audit charges.