Abstract: By using the panel data of Chinese cities and the time schedules of high-speed railway opening in each city, this paper employs the difference in difference method to examine the impact of high-speed railway construction on the service industry employment of the intermediate station cities. The findings show that high-speed railway can notably improve the employment level of service industries of the intermediate station cities, however, this kind of effect presents heterogeneous features due to the differences in regions and industries. The impact of high-speed railway construction on the employment of such service industries as wholesale and retail, leasing, business services, and resident service is significantly higher than that on other service industries, but such impact is not significant on the employment of the public service industries, such as the public facilities management (water conservancy, environment, etc.), the social welfare (health, sports, etc.), public management and social organizations. And that high-speed railway can significantly improve the employment level of the service industries of the intermediate station cities with higher degree of marketization, but for cities with lower degree of marketization, it is not significant.

Key words: high-speed railway; service employment; heterogeneity; DID Method; intermediate station