金融消费者保护:行为经济学的理论解析与政策建议

Financial Consumer Protection: Theoretical Analysis and Policy Application Based on Behavioral Economics

新古典经济学的严密体系有5个重要的基础性假设:完全理性、完全信息、效用最大化、偏好一致性以及自利性假设。行为经济学对这些假设提出了挑战,指出:消费者具有系统性、可预测的行为偏差,新古典经济学的5个假设与现实不符;金融机构会利用消费者的行为偏差谋利,导致竞争非有效;要在传统纠正市场失灵方法的基础上,重视从更深层面上纠正消费者行为偏差;需要结合具体的偏差类型,采取自由放任、政府干预、市场化取向的政府柔性干预等思路纠正消费者行为偏差;为更好地保护消费者权益,需要对金融机构进行行为干预和产品干预,提高信息披露的有效性,推进金融知识普及和金融消费者能力建设。行为经济学动摇不了新古典经济学的统治地位,但其挑战是有力的,对人类行为的认识和解释更加接近于实际,也促进了新古典经济学的发展。我国在加强金融消费者保护的过程中,应支持行为经济学的发展,重视行为经济学研究成果的应用。

The new classical economics is based on five important assumptions： perfect rationality, perfect information, utility maximization, preference consistency and self-interest hypothesis. Behavioral economics queries and challenges these assumptions：Consumers are systematically and predictably irrational, and those basic assumptions are not in line with the reality. Financial institutions may make a profit by manipulating consumer biases. As a result, market competition may be not effective. In addition to the traditional remedies, policymaker should pay more attention to addressing market failures by correcting consumer biases. Different ways can be used to correct consumer different biases. They are laissez-faire, government intervention and government flexible/soft intervention under the premise of marketization. To better protect financial consumers, authorities should regulate financial institutions＇ behaviors, control products, improve the effectiveness of information disclosure, promote financial literacy and improve consumers＇ ability. The challenges of behavioral economics is powerful, but it can not shake the dominant position of new classical economics. It makes people better understand and explain human behaviors and also promotes the development of new classical economics. During strengthening financial consumer protection, China should support the development of behavioral economics and pay more attention to application of behavioral economics.