China Social Science Review

No.1, 2023

Theoretical Approaches and Evaluation of Practice in the Measurement of the Digital Economy

(Abstract)

Zhou Yuanren and Chen Menggen

The rapid development of digital technology has had a huge impact on current statistical and accounting systems, and the measurement of the digital economy has become a hot topic for research against the backdrop of high-quality development. Theoretically, the content of digital economy measurement chiefly deals with the digital economy’s development level, its factors, new economic forms, the digitalization of traditional industries, etc. The main measurement methods include the production method, the expenditure method, the growth accounting method, the econometric method, the index compilation method, and the method of creating digital economy satellite accounts. In practice, digital economy measurement has made remarkable progress in a series of explorations carried out at home and abroad, but generally speaking, it still faces many difficulties. To grasp the trends of its development, we need to further clarify its scope and boundaries, continuously updating and improving the relevant statistical methods and strengthening the basic collection of data on digital economy statistics.