Yu Zheng

This project is one of the first empirical studies on social network and labor market outcomes. To date, researchers’ understanding of the topic has been severely limited by data availability. With a unique dataset from the Chinese internet giant Tencent, consisting of 300 million users (i.e. over 90 percent of the Chinese internet population) and 1.5 billion social interactions, this is the first time that any researchers have come close to understanding an entire population’s dynamics. Specifically, it affords us the opportunity to measure precisely how social network’s impact on labor market outcome depends upon various contexts. This project will be the first step of a long-term project whose ultimate objective is to generate network-topology based labor market policies.