如何从生命周期理解我国的收入不平等

Understanding Income Inequality in China from Life-cycle Perspective

文章从生命周期的角度入手,以期为理解收入不平等提供一个不同的视角。基尼系数本质上衡量的是结果的不平等,收入所得税等政府政策也侧重对结果不平等的调整,但收入结果的不平等起源于机会的不平等,强化于过程的不平等,最终才表现为结果的不平等。机会不平等、过程不平等和结果不平等对应不同的生命周期阶段,需要不同的政策措施。对于机会不平等,政府应着眼于消除户籍制度等对不同人群的制度性歧视,减少我国区域发展水平的差距;推动幼儿和青少年教育与医疗服务的均等化,为他们创造一个公平的养教环境。对于过程不平等,一个重要的方面是建立对各种所有制员工和不同雇佣关系职工都公平的城乡统一的市场环境,消除劳动力市场中同工不同酬等歧视现象,尤其是取消国家制度和政策造成的劳动力市场分割。对于结果不平等,要兼顾公平和效率,在现有个人所得税、最低生活保障制度等基础上,逐步建立城乡统一、公平公正的收入调节和社会保障体系。

This paper aims to understand income inequality in China from a different perspective based life-cycle. The commonly used and Gini coefficient can only measure the outcome inequality,and the public polices such as individual income tax also focus on the adjustment for the outcome inequality. However,income inequality stems from opportunity inequality,is reinforced during process inequality,and finally exhibits as outcome inequality. It is necessary to adopt different polices and measures to deal with opportunity inequality and process inequality since they are corresponding to different stages of life-cycle. For opportunity inequality,the public policy should focus on eliminating Hukou system,reducing regional disparity in development,promoting equal accessibility to basic educational and health services,and creating a fair nurture environment for children and adolescents. For process inequality,an important aspect is to establish a unified rural-urban labor market,treat all workers equally regardless of their employer＇s ownership and type of labor contract,and to eliminate labor segmentations,especially the ones due to legal and governmental policies. For the outcome inequality,the policy should weight both equity and efficiency. The government should gradually establish a unified income adjustment and social security system based on the existing individual income tax system,minimum living standard system,pension system,etc.