Teaching them to fish: long-term employment effects of China’s rural e-commerce program

This study examines the long-term employment impacts of China’s large-scale ‘E-Commerce into the Countryside’ (ECC) project, providing new insights into how extensive digital poverty alleviation programs can generate sustainable improvements in rural livelihoods. We find that, although the ECC policy initially increases rural employment, its long-term effect gradually diminishes and eventually becomes statistically insignificant. Nevertheless, heterogeneity analysis reveals that counties with stronger platform operations and service capacities avoid such attenuation. A cost-benefit assessment indicates that the welfare benefits of the ECC substantially outweigh its fiscal costs. These findings highlight the importance of developing robust rural e-commerce ecosystems to sustain employment growth.