Competition Pressure, Work Hours and Welfare Valuation in a China-Calibrated Agent-Based Macroeconomic Model

We study how assumed pressure responses shape work hours, macroeconomic outcomes and welfare in a China-calibrated agent-based stock-flow-consistent model that combines a 2017 social accounting matrix with a 2016 CFPS schedule anchor. Household income-gap and employer-pressure loadings are scenario inputs rather than estimates; 1320 supplementary runs vary their signs and test the model’s mechanisms. Negative employer loadings reverse the hours response, and macroeconomic outcomes are not monotone in hours: under market-share competition, income-gap pressure alone raises output and lowers unemployment, whereas adding employer pressure lengthens hours, lowers output and raises unemployment. At the central loadings, pressure raises mean hours under competition by 13.75 h, or by 6.13 h with an upper-tail hours cost; remaining saturation at the hours bound limits quantitative interpretation. The competition-associated output loss survives removing the above-anchor labour increment or the markup-pressure term, and the pressure-induced output reversal survives unifying consumption propensities or removing the direct wage squeeze; its wage–income counterpart reflects mainly employment losses. At the reference unemployment penalty, valuing non-market time does not amplify the competition welfare loss in any of 80 sampled designs; only higher, exploratory unemployment weights do. The model supports conditional scenario analysis, not causal or policy-effect estimates for China.