论公共选择和经济选择的本质区别——基于多数规则下两种利益再分配的讨论

人类生活中同时存在着公共选择和经济选择,两者除原有已提出的共性外,还应补充多数规则这一共性。原有理论只重视两者的共性而忽视了它们的区别,或是仅将其区别归结为偏好是否一致的假设。其实两者的本质区别不在于选择者的偏好,而在于其支付能力的完全不同:公共选择是人口选票,而经济选择是资源选票。公共选择中是占人口少数的富人向占人口多数的穷人转移利益;经济选择中是持有少数资源的穷人向持有多数资源的富人转移利益。可见在同一多数规则下由于各自支付能力的不同,两者再分配发生的利益转移方向完全相反。两种选择因支付能力之不同产生两种不同的公平标准,每一个社会群体或利益集团,都是以自己占多数之选择领域的公平标准来要求其他领域的选择结果,这样就不可避免地产生抱怨和冲突。

On the Utterly Difference between Public Choice and Economic Choice

There coexist two main types of choices that are public one and economic one.Besides the established commonality,majority principle should be seriously considered.The established theory only focuses on the commonality while ignoring the distinction,or simply boils down to the hypothesis of the consistence of preferences.In fact,the intrinsic distinction between these two is not the preferences but the utterly difference of the payment abilities: public choice involves population ballot,while economic choice concerns resource ballot.Public choice brings the positive interests-shifting from the minority rich to majority poor,while the economic choice generates the interests-shifting from resource deficient poor to resource abundant rich.It is clear that under the same principles,the shift of interests is heading the opposite direction.Because of the different payment abilities,these two relocating choices result in two different equity standards.Every society group or interest group demands others to choose according to the equity standard reflecting its own advantages,which inevitably results in complaints and conflicts.