How can the digital economy develop sustainably in the future? The big guys say this

The digital economy is the future development direction of the world. In 2019, the digital economy in Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States accounted for more than 63.4% of GDP; in 2020, China's digital economy accounted for 38.6% of GDP. It still achieved a growth of about 10% during the epidemic, making outstanding contributions to economic recovery.

In the future, how to promote the further development of the digital economy? In this process, how can technology empower us? At the 2021 Tsinghua PBC Global Financial Forum, Zhang Xiaoyan, Xinyuan Chair Professor of Finance and Vice Dean of Tsinghua University PBC School of Finance, Zhang Xiaoyan, Deputy Dean of Tsinghua University Financial Technology Research Institute and Tsinghua University National Institute of Finance, and Ye Wei, CEO of 58 Digital Accepted an interview with China Fortune Network and answered the above questions.

The digital economy helps global economic recovery

“The digital economy has three main contributions to economic recovery. One is to increase employment opportunities; the other is to reduce the cost of information acquisition, learning costs and the promotion of new technologies. cost and improve economic production capacity; third, it directly stimulates residents’ consumption,” said Ye Wei.

In recent years, emerging positions such as network operations, short video review, express delivery, online ride-hailing drivers, and anchors have continued to emerge, creating a large number of diversified employment opportunities. A report recently released by 58 City Recruitment Research Institute shows that in the first quarter of 2021, thanks to the rapid development of the digital economy represented by live streaming e-commerce and O2O, the recruitment demand for couriers increased by 67.83% month-on-month, the fastest increase.

In addition, Ye Wei further pointed out that although residents’ consumption expenditure has dropped significantly due to the impact of the epidemic, with the development of the digital wave, a large number of offline physical stores, entertainment activities, etc. have moved online, and residents have moved online. Consumption habits have been cultivated, and new business formats and models such as cloud classrooms, cloud entertainment, and cloud housing purchases have injected new impetus into economic development.

Zhang Xiaoyan also said that after the test of the 2020 epidemic, the digital economy has played a huge role in helping companies resume work and production and promoting labor employment.

Take Chongqing’s Dazu District as an example. During the epidemic, the place experienced a serious imbalance in the upstream and downstream industrial chains, and encountered a shortage of cash flow and labor. In order to improve the situation, the local government took the lead in creating a digital economic ecosystem, allowing enterprises to carry out intelligent transformation through the "Government and Enterprise Service Platform", thereby achieving cost savings and improving production efficiency, and enabling public officials to use the platform By conducting online work, other personnel can use it to obtain educational opportunities and employment information, benefiting many parties.

In the future, how will the digital economy lead new growth?

At present, although the digital economy has achieved considerable development, in Zhang Xiaoyan's view, the road ahead is still full of risks. For example, the mechanism for exchanging data among various industries and departments is not perfect enough, and there is digital segmentation; the issues of data security, legislation, and imbalanced development are prominent; in addition, how to conduct effective international cooperation is also a huge challenge.

How to develop the digital economy next? Zhang Xiaoyan believes that building a digital economic ecosystem is a stable, sustainable and balanced growth model.

"There are governments, companies, and individuals in this ecosystem." Zhang Xiaoyan said that the government can provide infrastructure for the development of the digital economy, create a healthy environment, and provide effective supervision; companies should use the digital economy to The ecosystem realizes its own upgrading and transformation, especially financial technology companies, which have both financial and technological attributes, and can help other companies join the ecosystem and provide funds for them; for residents, by participating in the digital economic ecosystem Promote their employment, increase their income levels, and enjoy better digital economic dividends.

In fact, the government has taken a lot of actions around infrastructure construction. As of the end of 2020, the total number of China Mobile communication base stations was 9.37 million, and 718,000 domestic 5G base stations were opened, covering cities at or above the prefecture level and key counties and cities across the country. At the same time, in order to build a digital economic ecosystem, governments in Zhejiang and other places have also made useful attempts.

“However, as far as the industrial chain is concerned, the problem now is that the downstream industries have taken the lead in crossing the threshold of the digital economy and are developing rapidly, such as online shopping, online ride-hailing, etc.; while the upstream manufacturing end On the supply side, due to weak infrastructure and lack of talents, the road to digitalization is still difficult. "Ye Wei pointed out that in the future, in order to realize the digitalization of the complete industrial chain, the government will need to provide support at the policy level and establish corresponding industry funds. In addition, encouraging core enterprises in industries with relatively successful digitalization to play a role model and supporting other companies in the industry chain in terms of technology and talent will also promote the deepening development of the digital economy.