地方资源禀赋、制度环境与地方债发行

Endowment,Institution and Local Government Debt Issue

我国地方政府债务水平的高速增长引发了各界的关注,而地方政府的发债动机、发债能力也饱受质疑。本文利用2004—2012年我国地级市的发债数据,对政府发债动机及发债能力进行研究。研究发现,地方政府的投资冲动与发行债券的可能性相关;地方政府财政赤字情况越严重,则发行债券的机会越低,而城市的经济规模、经济增速对城市发债能力也会产生正面影响。在此基础上,本文进一步研究制度环境对城市发债行为的影响。研究表明,金融成熟度对城市特征产生了"放大"效应,发债双方的关系更加遵从"市场规则";而"关系成本"的存在则打破了"市场规则"对地方政府的约束。

The expansion of the local government debt in China has raised serious doubts about the incentive and the solvency of the local officials. Through the empirical research from cities in China from 2004 to 2012, this paper indicates that the endowment of the city is an important element that affects the local officials＇ incentive and ability to issue bonds, which we call ＂Market Rules＂. Specially, the governments＇ ability of debt issuing becomes lower when facing the more serious financial deficit. Meanwhile, the probability of debt issuing will increase if the governments＇ impulsion to invest is stronger and the same is true of the cities with higher GDP and economy growth rate. Furthermore, we find that the ＂Market Rules＂ appears to he more significant in the cities with higher financial maturity degree. Contrarily, the existence of ＂relationship payment＂ has broken the constraints of ＂ Market Rules＂ on local government. Our research enriches the understanding of local government debt.