In my code, I was trying to assign four phrases in first column second row in line with their description...
\documentclass[13pt]{book}
\usepackage{tabularx,booktabs}
\usepackage{multirow}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}
\centering
\caption{Table of Variables}
\begin{tabularx}{\textwidth}{c>{\raggedright}X}
\toprule
\textbf{Variables} & \textbf{Description:} \tabularnewline
\midrule
return on equity (ROE)
& Return on equity can can be found and should be picked from the annual report or quarter report of these 13 commercial banks(See Appendix 2)\tabularnewline
\midrule
Tier 1 capital \\
Capital buffer \\
Risk-weighted assets \\
Loan-to-deposit ratio \\
& Bank-specific factors can be found and should be picked from the annual report or quarter report of these 15 commercial banks(See Appendix 2)
\tabularnewline
\midrule
Ownership
& Using dummy variable to denote ownership. State-owned banks (including BOC, ICBC, CCB, ABC) are equal to 1, the others are equal to 0 \tabularnewline
\midrule
GDP
& China NBS Quarterly Data\\
available from 1992-2016 Q1 \tabularnewline
\midrule
Central bank interest rate
&
OECD Data \\
Short-term interest rates quarterly data\\
Long-term interest rate will be used if available\\
available from 1997 Q3 - 2015 Q1 \tabularnewline
\bottomrule
\end{tabularx}
\end{table}
\end{document}