Does Innovation Promote Common Prosperity in China: Evidence from City-Level Data

As a core determinant of sustained economic growth and high-quality development, technological innovation playing a critical role in advancing common prosperity. This study draws on panel data from 280 Chinese cities over the period 2008–2021 to examine the effects of technological innovation on common prosperity and identify the underlying mechanisms. The baseline regression results indicate that technological innovation significantly promotes common prosperity, and the finding remains robust under a battery of robustness checks. Furthermore, this paper identifies two transmission channels through which innovation facilitates common prosperity: economic growth and industrial structure optimization. In addition, heterogeneity analysis reveals that cities characterized by higher levels of education investment and more developed digital economies derive greater benefits from innovation-driven common prosperity. Last but not least, this paper provides policy-relevant insights for the realization of the common prosperity objective.