Abstract
This study examines the influence of public finance on marine economic development across three coastal provinces in southeastern China Guangxi, Guangdong, and Hainan from 2013 to 2022. It focuses on public revenue and public expenditure as fiscal inputs and evaluates their effects on two key indicators: Gross Ocean Product (GOP) and the Proportion of Marine Secondary Industry (PMSI). Using secondary data and quantitative methods including Pearson correlation and multiple regression analysis, the study identifies strong positive correlations between public finance and GOP (r = 0.992, 0.988; p < 0.01), suggesting that fiscal investments substantially boost marine economic output. However, more moderate correlations with PMSI (r = 0.43, 0.399; p < 0.05) indicate weaker impacts on structural industrial transformation. Regression results further show that public expenditure alone explains 81.5% of the variance in marine economic sustainability, while the inclusion of GDP as a moderating variable increases the explanatory power to 90.7%, highlighting the crucial role of economic context in shaping fiscal effectiveness. The findings reject the null hypotheses, demonstrating significant regional disparities in fiscal impact. This research provides empirical evidence to support targeted and context-sensitive fiscal policies aimed at balancing marine economic growth with structural and environmental sustainability.
