Network Effect Analysis And Policy Study Based On Industry Chain Of Electric Vehicle

Developing the electric vehicle industry is the indispensable way for China to become a powerful vehicle country from a big vehicle country,it is an important measure to save energy and protect environment.As one of the strategic emerging industries,supporting policy has always been a direct impetus to the development of the electric vehicle industry.From the perspective of the electric vehicle's industry chain,the paper selects charging infrastructure construction subsidies as the representative policy in the upstream chain and the vehicle purchase subsidies as the representative policy in the downstream chain.Based on the urban panel data from2011 to 2015,the paper uses the fixed effect regression model and the instrumental variable method to measure the influence factors of electric vehicle sales,and compares the effects of the charging infrastructure construction policy and the vehicle purchase subsidy policy in the industry chain by distinguishing between the direct network effect and the indirect network effect.The electric vehicle industry policy needs large investment and long operation cycle,the effects comparison of the different policies is helpful to reduce policy costs and improve policy efficiency for the long-term development of the electric vehicle industry.The results show that the charging infrastructure construction and the purchase subsidy both have significant effects on the promotion of electric vehicle sales.However,in the expansion phase of electric vehicle industry,the indirect network effect is greater than the direct network effect,so the upstream policy is superior to the downstream policy,under the condition of the same budget,charging infrastructure construction can create more market demand than purchase subsidy.When the purchase subsidy standard of electric vehicles recedes gradually,the amount of purchase subsidy decreases year by year.Hence,accelerating the construction of charging infrastructure and dealing with the problem of charging are the direction for future policy to develop the electric industry.