分权时序与地方财政支出结构——基于中国省级权力下放实践的经验分析

Sequential Decentralization and Regional Fiscal Expenditure Structure——An Empirical Analysis Based on the Practice of Provincial Decentralization in China

一直以来,地方政府因"重基建、轻民生"而饱受诟病,地方财政支出结构呈现经济性特征,已有研究较为全面地考察了分权的支出效应,却未曾问津地方财政支出结构的差异及其背后的原因。本文基于中国省以下不同类型权力下放的多样化选择,结合分权时序理论,探讨不同分权时序模式对地方财政支出结构的影响差异。研究证实,无论是行政分权先行还是财政分权先行,都会导致县级财政支出结构的扭曲,前者会带来民生性支出的显著缩减,而后者则会带来生产性支出的显著扩张。通过梳理不同类型分权改革的具体内容发现,对于实行行政分权改革的地区而言,在改革中对民生项目建设作出明确部署能够有效改善对民生支出的挤占,而设立县域经济发展的预期目标则会加剧财政支出结构偏向生产性;就实行财政分权的地区来看,明晰各级政府支出责任有助于地方财政支出结构的优化,而针对县级财政设立增收节支的激励措施则会产生截然相反的作用。本文的研究不仅为理解地方财政支出行为提供了一个全新视角,也为下一步推进和完善分权改革提供了思路。

Local governments have been criticized for emphasizing infrastructure construction and neglecting people’s livelihood.The regional fiscal expenditure structure is inclined to productive expenditure.Previous studies have comprehensively investigated the fiscal expenditure effect of decentralization,but have not explored the differences of the fiscal expenditure structure and the underlying reasons.Based on the different decentralization under the provincial level in China,combined with the sequential theory of decentralization,this paper discusses the differences of regional fiscal expenditure structure under different decentralization sequences.The study confirms that both administrative decentralization and fiscal decentralization in advance will lead to the distortion of county-level fiscal expenditure structure.By sorting out the specific contents of decentralization reform,it is found that in the areas with administrative decentralization in advance,making a clear plan of livelihood projects can help reduce the risk of squeezing spending on people’s livelihood,while proposing the expected economic goal will aggravate the distortion.For regions with fiscal decentralization in advance,clarifying the government’s expenditure responsibility is helpful for improving regional expenditure structure,while proposing incentive measures to increase revenue and reduce expenditure will have the opposite effect.The study not only provides a new perspective for understanding the fiscal expenditure behavior of local governments,but also provides a direction for further decentralization reform.