Purpose/significanceTourism development has a spillover effect, not only on local economic development, but also on the economic development of other regions. This study focuses on the analysis of the impact of tourism development on the economic development of other provinces and districts, providing a reference for enriching the relevant studies on the impact of tourism on economic development, fully understanding the role of tourism development and enhancing the spillover effects of tourism development.

Methods/processesThe data of Beijing's tourism receipts and other 30 provinces' GDP from 1994 to 2015 are collected to construct a VAR model, and the impact of the Beijing tourism development on the economic development of other provinces and regions is analyzed by using Granger causality tests, impulse response functions, and variance decomposition tools.

Result/ Conclusion(1) Development of Beijing tourism has spillover effect on economic development in other 30 provinces, but it takes a long time to show up. The shorter the time, the smaller the effect, and the smaller the space scope. On the other hand, the larger the spillover effect, the larger the space scope. (2)The spillover effect and its degree are influenced by the correlation between tourism and economy as well as value of investment. Furthermore, the impact of tourism on development of economy wenkens as time goes by, and will disappear in later period after adding the lag variable. (3)The impact effect of tourism on economy usually occurs in the early stage, and peaks in the first or second period after the lag phase. The effect of tourism on development of economy will take on positive spillover effect, and the impact effect appears to have leveled off and then disappears gradually in the last period of lag phase.