Is spatial distribution of China’s population excessively unequal? A cross-country comparison

Abstract

© 2017, Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany. This study explores whether China’s population distribution is excessively biased toward large cities or coastal regions. The test is based on a fixed effects model estimated from a 5-year panel dataset for 101 countries, and two spatial inequality measures are computed from 0. 25 ∘ × 0. 25 ∘ population grids for a parallel cross-country comparison. The results show that the spatial Gini coefficient for China does not deviate from a general trend, while Moran’s I index is biased upward. This suggests that the spatial inequality of China’s population distribution tends to be more obvious at the regional level than at the city level.