Abstract: The puzzle of population urbanization lag is revaled from the perspective of land resource mismatch. The empirical analysis has shown that the land resource mismatch has significant positive impact on population urbanization lag which has a significant impact on the impact of land resource mismatch according to the impulse response function and the effect is more lasting; and that the contribution rate of land resource mismatch to population urbanization lag reaches 50% according to variance decomposition. The study has such positive significance for policy-making as the mismatch of land resources has occupied the resources of service industry, pushed up urban housing prices, and hindered the process of population urbanization in China with the trend of service-oriented economic structure in China; the government should gradually relax the control of land transfer, reverse the mismatch of land resources, and play the basic role of the market in resource allocation.

Key words: land resources mismatch, population urbanization lag, VAR model