Empirical Research To The Relations Of Urbanization And Dual Structure Of Regional Economies In China

As we all know that city is the centers of economy, politics, science and technique, culture and education in a country or region, urbanization is the accompanying phenomenon of industrialization and modernization, the level of urbanization is one of important signs of the prosperity of a country. Urbanization means the development of social productivity, division of labor in society, and the population concentration, the quantity of city increase, the scale of city extend under the accumulative effects, it is a historical process in which the production mode and life style of human transform from countryside type to city type. Urbanization and industrialization complement and promote each other, advance simultaneously. The real urbanization in human society should be from the beginning of English Industrial Revolution, and our urbanization is from the foundation of P.R.China in 1949.Between the foundation of P.R.China and reform and opening, we have completed a set of industries system and got remarkable achievements, but this industrialization was in a narrow stage, because although the national economy was being industrialized, but the rural residents didn't benefit much from this process and their income was low. In the meanwhile, the growth of urbanization is slow too. In 1949, the level of urbanization was 10.6%, and the 1978's was 17.9%, increased 0.25% every year. After the reform and opening, the contracted responsibility system with remuneration linked to output was carried out, the town and township enterprises developed quickly, and the open policy expanded, the target of the socialist market economic system put forward and established, a series of great adjustments of national economic system has been made, the national economic proportion has been improved. With the rapid development of economic construction, the level of urbanization increased from 19.0% in 1979 to 45.7% in 2008, increased 1% every year.Achieved remarkable results in the national economy, we can not deny that agriculture has being in lagging position and provided an essential financial supports. The famous American economist——Lewis points out in the article of "economic development which the workforce supplied under the condition limitlessly", dual structure of economy--two entirely different sectors:traditional agricultural sector which is dominant and modern industrial sector which is advanced, is a general phenomenon existing in developing country's economic development. As a big agricultural country and the largest developing country, our urbanization lag behind the development of industrialization, the dual economic structure still serious. Our dual comparison ratio which measure the strength of dual economic structure is only 0.195 in 2008, far lower than the general level of developing countries. The large gap between city and rural areas is seriously hampering the sustainable development of our social economy.First, this paper sums up the meanings and essential characteristics of the urbanization and dual economic structure, introduces the basic theories and models concerned, and describes the level of urbanization and the index which measure the strength of the dual economic structure. And then, represented by the United Kingdom, the United States and Japan, this paper introduces the experiences of urbanization and dual economic structure's transformation of developed countries, describes the process of urbanization and the formation, distinctiveness of dual economic structure in our country. After that, this paper takes our actual situations as empirical research, verifies, the inner relationship between urbanization and dual economic structure by econometric model, presents the transmission mechanism between urbanization and dual economic structure. In the end, this paper points out countermeasures which benefit the transformation of dual economic structure.