Is There Coupling Effect between Financial Support and Improvement of Human Settlement? A Case Study of the Middle and Lower Regions of the Yangtze River, China

Currently, there are opposing views on the issue of whether financial support plays a role in improving the human settlement. This article is dedicated to exploring the mutual influence of financial support and the improvement of human settlements from the perspective of coupling effects, and determining the characteristics of coupling and coordination to promote the sustainable development of China and developing countries. This paper uses the entropy method and the coupling coordination model to estimate the coupling and coordination types of financial support and human settlements in seven provinces in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River from 2005 to 2018. In addition, the spatial autocorrelation model is adopted to determine the spatial agglomeration characteristics of the coupling and coordination of financial support and human settlements. All in all, this paper believes that financial support has improved the human settlements, and that there is a coupling effect. Specifically, the coupling coordination value of financial support and human settlements fluctuated from 0.034 to 0.436, showing an inverted U-shaped development trend as a whole. In addition, the correlation between financial support and the improvement of the human settlements is currently in the stage of barely balanced development, and there is a gap between benign and coordinated development. Secondly, the coupling and coordination between financial support and human settlements has significant spatial agglomeration characteristics, and the coupling effect in the eastern region is weaker than that in the western region. In particular, Jiangxi was mainly distributed as high to high agglomeration, and Jiangsu was mainly distributed as high to low agglomeration. It has formed a coupling and coordinated development area with Jiangsu-Jiangxi as the axis, radiating the development of adjacent areas. This research reveals the heterogeneity of financial support to the improvement of human settlements in different regions, portrays the coupling characteristics of financial support and the improvement of human settlements, and provides ideas for the coordinated development of the two.