Socioeconomic impacts of a shortage in imported oil supply: case of China

Oil is an essential and important energy source and is related to energy security and national strategy. Based on a recursive dynamic computable general equilibrium model, this study examines the potential impacts on the major socioeconomic indices in China, which includes economic growth, price level, employment, household welfare, and production activity, under different imported oil shortage scenarios. Results show that oil shortage has negative impacts on China’s economic growth; if all the extra proceeds from domestic oil price increase is assigned to government budget for compensating investment loss, the negative impacts on GDP will mainly stem from its negative impacts on total consumption; the decrease in labor income plays an obviously greater role in the decrease in total consumption than the effects of an increase in CPI. The negative impacts on rural households are greater than urban households. The profit of most production sectors, and the export of almost all sectors, will be negatively influenced.