转型期台湾收入差距的调节手段分析

An Analysis of Regulating Measures for Income Gap Issue in Taiwan during the Transitional Period

面对收入差距扩大化与贫穷增加问题,累进税制与社会福利制度等通常是各国及地区调节社会收入分配的主要手段。由于经济与政治方面的种种原因,台湾实际上主要依赖社会福利支出的不断增加来缓和收入差距的扩大化,税制的效果十分有限。这种严重扭曲的重分配模式,不仅削弱了调节收入差距的应有成效,而且对转型期的台湾经济与社会造成明显的不良影响。其一,社会福利支出持续增加,却无税收增加的支撑,造成财政收支持续恶化的困境;其二,税制的公平性长期受到严重扭曲,不但无法有效发挥改善收入分配的功能,而且因税负不公平,还助长了收入差距的扩大化;其三,异化的社会福利政策,日益沦为政治选举的工具,无法真正体现社会公平与正义。

Progressive taxation and social welfare system are the normal chief means used to deal with the widening of income gap and the enhancement of poverty issue in various countries or regions. However, it is the increasing growth of social welfare payment that indeed helps narrow the gap between the rich and the poor in Taiwan due to the economic and political reasons while the effectiveness of tax system proves to be very limited. This distorted pattern of redistribution has not only weak- ened the method performance, but also made an adverse impact on the economy and society in Taiwan during the transitional pe- riod. First of all,without complementary revenue,the growth of social system spending has worsened the financial balance. Sec- ondly, the inadequacy of equitability in tax system has widened the income gap rather than narrow it. And thirdly, the alienation of social welfare policy has made itself the tactics of election ,which can not fully embody social justice and equity.