公共教育投入与收入差距:基于32个国家面板数据的实证分析

Public Education Expenditure and the Gap of Income Distribution:An Empirical Research Based on Panel Data of 32 Countries

本文使用32个国家1996—2017年间面板数据,对公共教育投入与收入差距之间的关系进行了实证检验。面板格兰杰因果检验结果表明,整体上公共教育投入是基尼系数的单向格兰杰“因”,在滞后期较长时,两者互为格兰杰“因”。分不同经济发展阶段来看,高收入国家中两者间“无显著因果”,中高收入国家中两者为“双向因果”,中低收入国家中则表现为前者对后者的“单向因果”。进一步使用面板误差修正模型发现,增加公共教育投入从长期来看有助于缩小贫富差距,但是短期影响不显著。在处于不同经济发展阶段的国家中,上述影响仅在中高收入国家中显著,而在高收入和中低收入国家中不显著。当高等教育入学率和政府负担比例较低时,公共教育投入不仅不能从长期缩小收入差距,反而会在短期扩大收入差距。上述研究结论对我国的启示在于,应当继续发挥公共教育投入主渠道作用,推动高等教育普及化程度进一步提高,并更加关注教育机会均等化问题,从而缩小贫富差距。

Using panel data from 32 countries in 1996—2017,this paper examines the relationship between public education expenditure and income inequality.Panel Granger test draws the following conclusions.Public education expenditure is the Granger cause of GINI indicator generally, while they are Granger causes mutually in the long run.For high income countries, there’s none significant causal relationship;for higher income countries, there’s two-way Granger relationship;and for lower income countries, there’s one-way relationship between education funding and income gap.Panel VEC model results show that, increasing education expenditure can narrow the income gap in the long term instead of short term.This relationship exists significantly for higher income countries but other countries.In addition, lower tertiary enrollment rate and public burden proportion will reduce the influence on decreasing income gap, and even enlarge the income gap in the short term.With the increasing of education funding, government should continue to play the main role, expand the higher education enrollment, and emphasize on the educational inequity issues striving to close the income gap.