Abstract: Based on the data results of the third China’s national economic census, with the aid of Moran’s I index, this paper conducts a spatial auto-correlation analysis of the distribution?characteristics of China’s cultural industry. Combining the theory of industrial development, step-wise regression analysis and Ramsey test, it analyzes the factors affecting the cultural industry from both of the theoretical and empirical aspects. Then it applies the spatial?econometric?method to conduct an empirical analysis of the main factors influencing China’s cultural industry. The results show that there exist remarkable weak positive spatial autocorrelation in China’s cultural industry regions. Such factors as industry cluster, cultural consuming demands, cultural resources endowment, human capital and government support all have obvious effects on the promotion of cultural industry development. Remarkable positive spillover effect has also been found existing in the cultural industry regions.

Key words: cultural industry; Moran’s I index; step-wise regression; Ramsey test; spatial econometrics