New-Type Urbanization in the AI Era and the Role of Government

This paper focuses on the core question of whether the AI era will alter the spatial distribution patterns of the population, systematically analyzing the impact of artificial intelligence on employment structure, population mobility, and new-type urbanization in China. The article argues that AI's impact on employment encompasses substitution effects, creation effects, complementarity effects, and income effects, thereby further driving the transformation of the employment structure towards the service sector. In the AI era, the spatial distribution of the population will not decentralize; on the contrary, it will further strengthen the trend of population concentration in coastal regions, large cities, and central urban areas. The service sector will become the primary source of employment growth in the AI era, with human-AI collaboration skills, social skills, and urban living experience emerging as core competencies for workers.

Building on this analysis, the paper discusses the new stage of China's urbanization in the AI era and its governance implications. It contends that China currently faces dual shortcomings: a relatively low share of the service sector and a low level of urbanization. The shift towards service-oriented employment in the AI era will propel China into a new phase of urbanization. In response to this trend, the focus of governance must shift from land development and manufacturing expansion during the traditional industrialization stage to population absorption, public service provision, data openness and collaboration, and social security restructuring. This shift requires adjustments in government incentive mechanisms. Efforts should be made to promote an inclusive AI strategy, accelerate the integration of migrant populations into urban life, reform the education system to cultivate human-AI collaboration skills, improve social security systems to accommodate flexible employment, and vigorously advance a new round of urban renewal, thereby constructing a new-type urbanization governance system suited to the AI era.