The Relationship between China’s Population Structure Change in Minority Areas, Economic Growth and Demographic Dividend—Based on an Empirical Analysis of Time Series Data from 1992 to 2012

Abstract

Because the sustainability of the economic development model has drawn much attention recently, the academic circle and the government have begun to focus on the population of minority areas. In past literature, due to the lack of the positive analysis of the relationship between minority population transition and economic development, and due to sample limitation and other factors, the research result is not very convincing. This paper used the economic convergence theory to establish a theoretical model, and selected the panel data in eight minority-concen- trated provinces from 1992 to 2012 to analyze the impact of population transition in these provinces on economic growth. The result reveals a significant positive correlation between investment, human capital, the growth rate of labor and per capita GDP growth, a significant negative correlation between children’s dependency ratio and per capita GDP growth, and an uncertain relationship between elderly dependency ratio and per capita GDP growth. To maximize the democratic dividend, it is necessary to speed up the development of educational undertakings in minority areas, and to accelerate the industrial structure transition of minority areas. It is also important to perfect institutional improvement of minority areas.