Analysis of Lead and Lag Relations between Tourism and National Economy

Opinions on the acceleration of tourism development released by the State Council in December 2009 pointed out for the first time that tourism should be positioned as a strategic pillar industry in national economy and needs to be recognized as a modern service profession satisfied by the public. Over these years, scholars from home and abroad have widely agreed that tourism exerts multiplier effects on national economy by empirical data analysis. However, the lead and lag relationship between Chinese tourism and economy hasn't been studied extensively yet, which influences such crucial issues as the study and drafting of tourism policies. Hence this paper takes advantage of cross spectral analysis, a method to test relations between time series to find out that the development of tourism always lags behind that of economy and the coherency between them becomes greater when period is around 5 to 8 years. According to the results, this paper puts forward some effective ways in the conclusion section to balance the tourism demand and supply, thus helping to maintain the steady growth of tourism and the national economy as well.