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This article discusses the impact of central bank digital currency (CBDC) from the perspective of monetary and fiscal policy. We mainly discuss how retail CBDC can improve traditional policy performance. We argue that A CBDC helps existing monetary policies to break through the zero lower bound, shorten the policy time lag, realize selective policy interventions, and make possible the price level target policy system. Similarly, the combination of CBDC and smart contracts can directly affect the performance of the fiscal policy. Compared with the convenience and impact of CDBC as a medium of exchange, its impact as a policy tool is more profound. The current monetary policy is facing a zero lower bound. The fiscal policy is facing a huge sovereign debt crisis and the impact of other private digital currencies on fiat money, which makes the importance of CBDC as a new policy tool more prominent. However, the research on CBDC as a policy tool has many fundamental questions that remain to be answered. This paper contextualizes CBDC with global challenges in policies and new technology advances, and the authors rethink CBDC from a policy perspective, which may provide many new thoughts and have implications for the rise of global CBDC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we examine the role of peer‐to‐peer (P2P) platforms in enhancing financial inclusion from the borrowers' point of view across the rural–urban dimension. We show that when number of bank branches decrease in a rural community, the P2P loan requests increase if there is at least one bank branch in the community allowing people to participate in the P2P market. We also find that the number of P2P loan requests from urban areas is higher when such areas have fewer pawnshops per capita. Our results suggest that P2P enhances financial inclusion of those lacking traditional institutions in rural communities and offers an alternative to those with fewer fringe banks in urban communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated whether self‐reported impact of financial debt on health is different for women as compared with men. We found that female respondents are more likely to report that debt has affected their health. The results persisted when the analysis was performed on subsamples of employed individuals, married households and those with underwater mortgage (i.e., outstanding balance on mortgage is higher than the current value of the home). Prior studies have found that for a given level of debt, females are more likely to perceive higher levels of stress. When we controlled for stress perception, the health impact of debt was not higher for females. Some types of debt like credit card debt, student debt and loans from friends and family are known to result in higher levels of stress. Our findings persisted when we limited our sample to top users of credit card debt, to those with student debt or to those with loan(s) from friends and family. Prior studies have shown that mortgage debt is associated with lower levels of stress as compared with other types of debt. We found that in households with underwater mortgage, health impact of debt was higher for females even after we accounted for gender differential in stress perception. Our findings suggest that women's tendency to experience higher levels of stress for a given level of debt mediates the increased likelihood of women reporting that debt has affected their health. However, there exists a possibility that some types of debt in some situations impact health of women more than men for reasons other than debt‐related stress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last couple of decades, China's software and services industry has emerged as the driving power of economic growth playing a significant role in leading innovation in China. Research on inter-city network structure, drawing on patent cooperation among cities, helps understand the positioning of cities in terms of software and service-related innovation. This helps guide urban- or regional-development strategy. In this paper, we investigate 22,316 patents of software and service-listed firms. We examine the number of patent applications, technological innovation and development, and the geographical distribution of companies owning patents using Social Network Analysis (SNA). Our results show that: (1) Chinese software and service-related innovation has a notable agglomeration in a few geographically dispersed mega-cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen; (2) the technological innovation and development of the software and services industry in China is deeply dependent on importing technologies from foreign countries, particularly from the United States and Japan; and (3) the "Industry-University-Research" combination effect of innovation in China is still relatively low. Our policy recommendations include encouragement of cooperation, innovation of investment mechanism, preferential tax treatment of enterprise income tax, and sustainable and improved learning programs for nurturing highly qualified professionals to create an environment for independent innovation and entrepreneurship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]