The impact of platform economy on urban–rural income gap: a mediation effect test based on land use efficiency

This paper selects provincial panel data from China from 2015 to 2024. Based on measuring the development level of the platform economy, the Spatial Durbin Model is employed to empirically examine the intrinsic mechanism between the platform economy and the urban–rural income gap. At the same time, empirical tests have been conducted on the mediating effect of land use efficiency in the process of narrowing the urban–rural gap through the platform economy. The results indicate: (1) The impact of platform economy development on the urban–rural income gap exhibits a “U-shaped” trend of first narrowing and then expanding. Currently, most provinces in China remain on the left side of the “U-shaped” curve without crossing the inflection point, suggesting that platform economy development still contributes to narrowing the urban–rural income gap. (2) The impact of the platform economy on the urban–rural income gap demonstrates spatial spillover effects, where indirect effects outweigh direct effects, resulting in an overall negative total effect. (3) The platform economy can narrow the urban–rural income gap by improving land use efficiency. Currently, China’s platform economy mainly reduces the urban–rural income gap through four aspects: revitalizing idle rural assets, optimizing agricultural land allocation, enhancing land output value, and comprehensively improving land capital knowledge density. (4) The impact of the platform economy on the urban–rural income gap is heterogeneous. Research has found that the promotion effect of the platform economy on the urban–rural income gap in the eastern region is greater than that in the central and western regions, while the promotion effect on the urban–rural income gap in the central region is smaller than that in the western region, indicating that the central region is an important area for the platform economy to narrow the urban–rural gap. Overall, this article studies how the platform economy can narrow the urban–rural income gap by improving land use efficiency from both theoretical and empirical perspectives, and proposes corresponding policy recommendations. This not only helps enrich the research on narrowing the urban–rural income gap, but also expands the research on land use efficiency from the perspective of the platform economy.