消费品进口关税下调的贸易与福利效应

Quantifying Trade and Welfare Effects of Consumption Goods Tariff Reduction

扩大进口,满足消费者日益提高的商品需求,是中国近年来贸易政策的重要议题。2018年7月,中国主动降低了1588个税目的进口消费品的最惠国税率。本文采用2017-2019年的月度海关数据估计了这一政策对中国进口与消费者福利的影响。结果显示:(1)关税下调对于消费品进口产生了显著的促进作用。(2)关税下调对消费品不含税的进口价格无明显影响,即关税传递率接近完全。(3)关税下调使得中国的消费品总体进口价格下降约3%,每年带来约402亿元的消费者福利改进。(4)消费品占进口总额的比重由于关税下调上升了0.35个百分点,上升幅度为4%。本文的结论意味着消费品关税下调有利于中国消费者福利的提升,并有助于改变消费品在中国进口中比重偏低的现状。

A central issue in China’s trade policy in recent years is to promote imports to meet consumers’growing demand for commodities.In July 2018,China lowered the most-favoured-nation(MFN)tariff rate on 1,588 imported consumption goods.This paper estimates the impact of this policy on imports and consumer welfare,using monthly customs data from 2017 to 2019 in China.The results reveal that:(1)tariff reduction significantly promoted the import of consumption goods;(2)the tariff reduction has almost no effect on tariff-exclusive prices,i.e.,the tariff pass-through rate is nearly complete;(3)the tariff reduction lowered China’s import prices for consumption goods by about 3%,increasing by consumer welfare by approximately 40.2 billion Yuan annually;and(4)the proportion of consumption goods in total imports increased by 0.35 percentage points,or the increase rate is 4%,due to the tariff reduction.Our analyses suggest that the reduction of tariffs on consumption goods has substantially improved consumer welfare in China and facilitated to change the status quo of a low proportion of consumption goods in China’s imports.