路径依赖对财政政策变迁的规范作用

财政政策作为一种政府主导的制度安排,其变迁的方向不是随机的,而是存在着路径依赖。当财政政策变迁存在着报酬递增和自我强化机制时,路径依赖就会对其产生规范作用。在一定程度上,财政政策的恰当性会进一步加强路径依赖的这种规范性作用。研究路径依赖对财政政策变迁的规范作用,对于推动我国财政政策的良性循环与变迁具有重要意义。     

The effectiveness of government spending on education and health care in developing and transition economies

Recent studies show that corruption is associated with higher military spending [Eur. J. Polit. Econ. 17 (2001) 794] and lower government spending on education and health care [J. Publ. Econ. 69 (1998) 263]. This suggests that policies aimed at reducing corruption may lead to changes in the composition of government outlays toward more productive spending. However, little empirical evidence has been presented to support the claim that public spending improves education and health indicators in developing and transition countries. This paper uses cross-sectional data for 50 such countries to show that increased public expenditure on education and health care is associated with improvements in both access to and attainment in schools, and reduces mortality rates for infants and children. The education regressions are robust to different specifications, but the relationship between health care spending and mortality rates is weaker.     

美国财政分权的效率分析

美国作为一个高度发达的市场经济国家,不但在经济发展领域里取得了令人瞩目的成就,而且在制度的设计、创新和发展等方面也有许多值得借鉴之处,美国财政分权体制就是其中之一.本文在分析财政分权效率的含义及要求的基础上,从美国政府问事权和财权划分明确且相互匹配、科学合理的转移支付制度、分权与制衡并存的预算机制、地方政府自治以及整个财政分权体制的法律依据等方面分析了美国财政分权高效的原因.     

Joseph A. Schumpeter’s contributions in the area of fiscal sociology: a first approximation

Fiscal sociology deals with the ramifications of the fiscal activities of the state into areas which are not their primary target. These effects may occur in sectors not directly affected such as related markets, but they may also occur outside the economic sphere proper, such as in politics, culture, religion, or society at large. Schumpeter contributed to the research project of fiscal sociology throughout his life. In this first approximation, his contribution is discussed in terms of his appreciation of three important scholars who all made landmark contributions to fiscal sociology: Franz Oppenheimer, Werner Sombart, and Gustav (von) Schmoller.JEL Classification: B15, H39     

我国财政收支划分的立法研究

财政收支划分是财政管理体制的重要组成部分.在市场经济体制下,财政收支划分立法有利于政府职能的履行和公共财政的运行,是完善分税制财政管理体制的丛然要求.完整的财政收支划分法律制度应当由财政级次划分、财政收支分类、财政支出划分和财政收入划分等制度构成.     

Monetary and Fiscal Policy Interactions in the Euro Area

The problem of monetary and fiscal policy interactions is an important issue for the euro area, since the individual member states of the EMU are responsible for their fiscal policies but monetary policy is pursued by a single monetary authority, the ECB. This paper is concerned with empirical evidence on monetary and fiscal policy interactions in the euro area. We first explore fiscal regimes with a VAR model and find empirical evidence that a non-Ricardian fiscal policy has been pursued in both France and Germany. As an example, we then study how one member state of the EMU, namely, Italy, is responding to the common monetary policy with its fiscal policy and find that Italian fiscal policy seemed to be counteractive to the common monetary policy between 1979 and 1998. In order to study monetary and fiscal policy interactions in a more general way, we explore time-varying interactions by estimating a State-Space model with Markov-switching for some Euro-area countries. There appear to be some regime changes in monetary and fiscal policy interactions in France and Germany, but the interactions between the two policies are not strong. Moreover, the two policies have not been accommodative but counteractive to each other. Finally we explore forward-looking behavior in policy interactions and find that expectations do not seem to have played an important role in the policy designs.     

财政分权框架下的财政政策和货币政策

本文扩展了Barro( 1 990 )和Gong和Zou( 2 0 0 2 )的模型 ,讨论财政分权框架下的政府财政政策和货币政策 ,通过消费者行为、地方政府行为和中央政府行为之间Nash均衡解 ,得到了经济增长率和各参数的隐式关系 ,并且通过数值模拟得到经济增长率与各种税收以及政府间转移支付的关系。我们发现经济增长率和收入税的关系是Laffer曲线 ,消费税对经济增长的影响是正的 ,财产税对经济增长的影响是负的。至于货币政策的影响 ,我们发现货币不再是超中性的了 ,供应量增加可以促进经济增长 ,而且经济中的货币的流通程度越高 ,经济增长率越高。最后 ,本文还讨论了多级地方政府的情况 ,分析了不同税收制度的地区对整个经济增长的不同影响。     

公共支出对我国技术效率的影响分析

文章首先应用随机前沿方法,估计了我国31省市的时变随机前沿生产函数模型,结果表明提高公共支出占GDP的比例能显著地降低技术效率,而提高公共支出的组成部分占GDP的比例对技术效率有显著的促进作用,其现实意义就是优化公共支出结构对我国的技术效率有促进作用.其次,计算了我国31省市的技术效率,结果发现东部与西部之间的技术效率差距较大,而且在进一步扩大之中.再次,对TFP变化率进行了分解,分析表明:不论是从全国还是从东中西部三地区看,对技术效率影响最大的因素都是规模经济性,而技术进步和资源配置效率影响较小.最后,根据我国目前以规模经济性对TFP变化率为主要影响因素的实际情况,指出从公共收支视角来提高技术进步和资源配置效率对TFP变化率的影响,缩短东西部技术效率的差距,是一条高效率的公共支出发展之路.     

关于“双顺差”背景下实现中国内外均衡的思考

内外均衡目标是指充分就业、物价稳定、经济增长及国际收支均衡。目前，中国正面临通货紧缩的压力和国际收支双顺差的格局，因此需通过扩张性的财政及货币政策进行协调，同时辅以汇率及利率政策。只有内外兼顾统一才能使经济实现稳定发展。     

How to reform China’s fiscal system?

ABSTRACT

As the population aging, China’s government expenditures, including general fiscal expenditure, healthcare and social security expenditure, will grow more rapidly than government revenues, tending to elevate government debt. Local governments undertake overwhelming 85% of total general fiscal revenue and are responsible for healthcare and social security, and their debt has been growing. Fiscal reforms are imperative, including tax reforms, the structure of government spending reforms, social security reforms, healthcare reforms, local public finance reforms, and central and local government’s fiscal relationship reforms. This paper will explore the fiscal challenges China faces and discuss how to reform the fiscal system to cope with these challenges.