| YU Shuguang,LI Chuanchuan,ZHANG Xueyuan,LIN Chaonan.Fiscal Subsidies and Consumption Promotion: Evidence from Local NEV Purchase Subsidy Policies in China[J].The Journal of quantitative and technical economics,2025,(12):24-44 |
| 财政补贴与提振消费——来自地方新能源汽车购置补贴的证据 |
| Fiscal Subsidies and Consumption Promotion: Evidence from Local NEV Purchase Subsidy Policies in China |
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| 中文关键词: 财政补贴 提振消费 新能源汽车 购置补贴 |
| 英文关键词: Fiscal Subsidies Consumption Stimulation New Energy Vehicles Purchase Subsidies |
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| 中文摘要: |
| 中国新能源汽车消费体量大、潜力足，是推动消费增长和扩大内需的重要驱动力。本文基于 2023 年城市—月度层面新能源汽车销量数据，探究消费端新能源汽车购置补贴政策的促消费效应。研究发现，消费端新能源汽车购置补贴显著促进了新能源汽车的消费，该影响通过激励边际消费群体消费和提升消费者未来预期效用予以实现。政策效果在北方地区及有新能源车企的城市更明显，对纯电动和插电混动车型、30 万元以下车型、国产品牌及传统车企生产的新能源车型具有显著促进作用，同时，力度越大、不限车型以及现金形式的补贴效果更好。进一步分析发现，新能源汽车购置补贴并未挤出燃油车消费，表明政策通过“以补促需”带动了增量消费，2023 年各地实行的新能源汽车购置补贴政策总计带动新能源汽车消费 670.1 亿元。本文为提振以新能源汽车等为代表的大宗消费、持续释放消费潜力提供经验借鉴。 |
| 英文摘要: |
| Boosting household consumption is pivotal for expanding domestic demand and strengthening China’s internal economic circulation. As China’s growth paradigm shifts from investment-led to consumption-driven, the challenge of insufficient effective demand, particularly weak consumer spending, has become increasingly salient. The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (hereinafter the Party) underscored the imperative of expanding domestic demand and reinforcing the foundational role of consumption in economic development. Consistent with this priority, both the 2024 Central Economic Work Conference and the 2025 Government Work Report identified “vigorously boosting consumption, enhancing investment efficiency, and comprehensively expanding domestic demand” as the foremost policy tasks for 2025. This reflects the unprecedented policy emphasis the Party and government have placed on stimulating consumption.Within this broader context, China’s new energy vehicle (NEV) consumption presents substantial growth potential. As one of the “four pillars” of household consumption, alongside home appliances, catering, and home furnishings, automobile retail sales reached 5.03 trillion yuan in 2024, accounting for 10.31% of China’s total retail sales of consumer goods. NEV retail sales totaled 10.899 million units, up 40.7% year-on-year, with a penetration rate of 47.6%. In July 2024, monthly NEV sales surpassed those of conventional fuel vehicles for the first time. Fiscal subsidies have been instrumental in this process.By directly reducing purchase costs, they have stimulated market demand and accelerated the rise of the NEV industry, while serving as a key policy lever for cutting carbon emissions in the transport sector and advancing China’s “dual carbon” goals. Following the phase-out of national-level subsidies, local governments introduced their own local NEV purchase subsidy schemes to maintain momentum. However, the critical question is “How effective are these local subsidies in driving NEV consumption?” A rigorous evaluation of their impact not only provides empirical evidence for sustaining durable consumption, including that of NEVs, but also has significant implications for the green transformation of the automobile industry and the high-quality development of China’s green economy.Drawing on monthly sales data from all prefecture-level cities in China in 2023, this study investigates the impact and underlying mechanisms of local NEV purchase subsidies and further assesses their spillover effects on conventional fuel vehicle consumption. The findings reveal that subsidies significantly stimulate NEV purchases primarily through two channels—incentivizing marginal consumers and enhancing consumers’ expectations of future utility. The policy effects are stronger in northern regions and in cities with NEV manufacturers and are most pronounced for battery electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles, models priced below 300,000 yuan, domestic brands, and NEVs produced by traditional automakers. Policies offering larger subsidies, broad eligibility, and cash-based disbursement mechanisms are most effective. Importantly, further analysis reveals that subsidies did not crowd out fuel vehicle consumption; instead, they generated incremental demand, contributing an additional 67.01 billion yuan in NEV consumption in 2023.This study makes three main contributions to the literature. First, it shifts the analytical focus from subsidies targeting technological performance to those targeting purchase behavior, thereby extending research on consumer responsiveness to fiscal stimulus and complementing studies that predominantly address subsidies during the early stages of NEV industry development. Second, whereas prior studies often relied on sales data from selected cities—typically those with higher NEV penetration—thereby risking an upward bias in policy effect estimates, this study employs monthly data covering all prefecture-level cities in China.This comprehensive dataset enables a more representative and robust assessment of subsidy effectiveness. Third, beyond evaluating aggregate impacts, the study explores heterogeneity in policy effects across different powertrain types, price segments, and manufacturer categories, as well as across variations in subsidy size, eligibility criteria, and delivery mechanisms. In doing so, it highlights shortcomings in policy design and provides evidence-based guidance for refining future consumption-promotion measures and improving the efficiency of subsidy expenditures. Moreover, by examining the effects of NEV purchase subsidies on conventional fuel vehicle sales, the study addresses whether the observed consumption stimulus arises primarily through substitution—via displacement of fuel vehicle market share—or through incremental demand creation, thus enriching and extending existing scholarly debates on this topic. |
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