Professor Xu Heng’s Team Publishes Research in Top Journal Economic Research Journal

Recently, the collaborative paper Household Registration Identity Conversion and Household Consumption Mobility in China by Postdoctoral Fellow Yao Jian, Professor Xu Heng and doctoral student Zhou Bowen from the School of Economics at Shandong University was published in Issue 10, 2025 of Economic Research Journal, a top domestic economics journal.

This paper mainly studies the impact of household registration identity conversion on household consumption mobility. Based on the analysis of China Family Panel Studies data, it analyzes the characteristics and evolution trend of household consumption mobility in China, and investigates the effect and mechanism of household registration identity conversion on household consumption mobility. The study finds that the overall household consumption mobility in China shows a downward trend. Compared with households with unchanged household registration identity, households with household registration identity conversion have higher consumption mobility, and the decline in consumption mobility is smaller and the quality is higher. Household registration identity conversion significantly improves household consumption mobility. Its mechanism is that household registration identity conversion brings more economic opportunities to households, including increasing non-agricultural employment opportunities, enjoying more products and services to increase consumption diversity, and improving households' confidence in the future. However, the impact of household registration identity conversion on consumption mobility is also constrained by consumption inertia. Relatively speaking, the impact of household registration identity conversion on consumption mobility is more obvious in households with higher income and net assets, higher education level and in regions with higher economic development level. This paper provides new micro evidence for understanding the consumption boosting effect of relaxing household registration system constraints in the process of Chinese-style modernization, and also provides more targeted policy enlightenment for unblocking social mobility channels and improving people's well-being in further deepening reform in an all-round way.

Xu Heng is a professor at the School of Economics at Shandong University and Director of the Institute of Consumption and Development. He has long been engaged in research on consumption economics, macroeconomics and industrial economics. He has published more than 200 papers in domestic and foreign journals such as Economic Research Journal, Philosophical Research, Economic Research Journal (Quarterly), and China Industrial Economics, and presided over more than 10 national and provincial major and key projects, including 2 Major Programs of the National Social Science Fund of China and 2 Major Tackling Programs of the Ministry of Education. He has won the "Sun Yefang Economic Science Award", the first prize, second prize of the "National University Humanities and Social Sciences Research Achievement Award" of the Ministry of Education, 3 first prizes of Shandong Provincial Excellent Social Science Achievements, and the Shandong Provincial Social Science Outstanding Contribution Award.

Yao Jian is a postdoctoral fellow at the School of Economics at Shandong University, selected into the National Funded Postdoctoral Researcher Program. His research direction is consumption economics and household finance. He has published more than 20 papers in domestic and foreign journals such as Economic Research Journal, Economic Research Journal (Quarterly), and Journal of Financial Research. He has presided over the Youth Program of the Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province and the Youth Program of the Social Science Planning Research of Shandong Province, and participated in many projects such as the Major Programs of the National Social Science Fund of China.