中国社会保障制度的收入再分配效应

Redistributive Effects of Social Security System in China

近年来,中国居民间的收入差距处于高位水平。作为促进社会稳定和经济发展与调节收入分配的重要手段,社会保障和福利制度在改观这种状况方面的作用不容忽视。基于北京师范大学中国收入分配研究院2013年的居民收入调查数据,本文考察了中国社会保障制度对收入再分配的影响效果。结果表明,社会保障制度在缓解贫困和调节收入分配方面都发挥了一定的作用。经过税费和各社会保障项目的调节后,2013年全国居民市场收入差距下降了约11%。分城乡来看,社会保障对收入再分配的调节作用在城市地区更为明显。分年龄组来看,社会保障的再分配效果主要是通过就业人群与退休人群间的收入转移实现的。需要指出的是,中国社会保障制度仍处于改革与发展阶段。与其他国家相比,中国社会保障在调节收入分配方面所发挥的作用相当有限。因此,要充分发挥社会保障制度的收入再分配效果,现行的社会保障体系需要进一步改革,不仅要实现制度的全覆盖,而且要减少同一种保障制度中不同人群的差异性。

Over the past forty years,income inequality in China has increased significantly and remains at a high level.Thus social security will play an increasingly important role in economic growth,balance of income distribution,poverty alleviation and maintenance of social stability.Using the household survey data collected by the China Institute for Income Distribution in 2013,this paper estimates the effects of social security programs on national income inequality.The empirical study shows that:firstly,the society security system has a positive impact on narrowing the income gap and alleviating poverty.With the function of all the social security schemes,the Gini coefficient of the national income inequality decreased by nearly 11 percentage points.Secondly,the redistributive effect of social security system is more obvious in urban areas.Thirdly,it shows that the social security system plays an important role in redistributing income mainly through transferring pension benefits to the elderly.However,compared with other countries,the redistributive effect of China’s social security and welfare system is very limited.Thus,in the future reform of social security and welfare system,China should not only further improve coverage to achieve the goal of covering the full population,but also establish a unified national social security system to change the fragmentation of the existing social security system.