Chapter 35 A rural policy commentator pleading for the people

Qin Xiaoying was transferred from the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China to the State-owned Assets Administration Bureau in 1994. He served as the director of the Propaganda and Education Center, and later as the editor-in-chief of "China Assets News". "China Finance and Economics News" is an authoritative daily in the field of finance and economy sponsored by the Ministry of Finance of the People's Republic of China.It focuses on promoting my country's fiscal and financial-based economic policies, reporting and commenting on world economic trends, market conditions, and world economic hotspot news. It is very popular in the fields of finance, economy, and trade, and its circulation is 500 in the capital Newspapers rank fourth.

This is a turning point for Qin Xiaoying after entering the economic field academically, for which he enjoys the special allowance for experts with outstanding contributions from the State Council.So some people listed him as one of the "Fifty Chinese Economists". Qin Xiaoying was quite disturbed when others called him an economist.In his opinion, like many Chinese intellectuals, he is just a follower and participant of China's economic development. He has no achievements in economics, but feels that he has done a good job in economic propaganda. Necessity and urgency.In fact, when the organizational department decided to let him chair the "China Finance and Economics News", it was obvious that he had a mature understanding of China's economic development, a strong sense of responsibility and great enthusiasm for China's economic reform.

Not to mention the influence of his paper on Lenin's New Economic Policy published in 1979, many of his subsequent proposals on China's economic reform are equally thought-provoking. As early as 1988, Qin Xiaoying issued a sensational warning on Chinese politics and economy in Economics Weekly: China has two "legacy" politically and economically and it is time to bid farewell to the 20th century, one is the legacy of "political giants" , and the other is the myth that man transforms nature. Historically, the destructive power of industrialization in the 20th century created the world's "political giants", such as Mao Zedong, Stalin, Roosevelt, Churchill, and even small countries such as Castro and Nasser.Qin Xiaoying believes that the social basis of "giant politics" is hero legends, myths and heroes appear at the same time, and the coexistence of farming society and industrialization makes "political giants" as powerful as gods; and this should be a product of the 20th century. When the new century is about to enter, people's worship of heroism should stay in the past era. The disappearance of "giant politics" "indicates that the value orientation of human beings is undergoing a qualitative leap, from the era when one person dominates a group of people to the era when everyone controls their own destiny."

Qin Xiaoying also believes that with the end of the age of giants, the myth of man transforming nature should also end.He saw that before the emergence of physics and modern mechanics, nature was transforming people, and people had to adapt to nature, so there were three ways of life: one was picking, which appeared in Africa; the other was farming, which appeared in China; The species is hunting and fishing, which appeared in Europe.But at the same time, he discovered that when the reaction of living conditions occurs, human beings will be punished; at the same time, once people think that their abilities and natural forces form a symmetrical counterbalance, the strongest desire is to transform society.In Qin Xiaoying's view, man and nature should live in harmony. The belief and actions of man in the early 20th century to conquer nature will inevitably lead to the merciless punishment of man by nature.

Here, Qin Xiaoying is actually explaining the topic of "sustainable development" between man and nature. At this time, it was 1988, 15 years ago. Four years later, China's sustainable development was put on the agenda. Qin Xiaoying has been paying attention to the three most sensitive aspects of China's economy since she joined China Finance and Economics News: rural tax and fee reform, regional income balance, and the development of state-owned enterprises. In December 1998, the central government put forward the idea of ​​"going out" for the first time.One month later, Qin Xiaoying organized a large-scale interview with the theme of "Going Out", leading the national press. In 1999, he organized a large-scale "Northern China Miles Tour" activity to interview the west, creating momentum for the development of the west.This activity was two years earlier than the national media began to report on the development of the western region on a large scale after 2001.

In order to arouse the society's attention to Northeast industry, he opened a series of long report columns in "China Assets News" and "China Finance and Economics News", called "The Eldest Son of the Republic", reporting on the Northeast old industry in the first five-year plan of the Republic History and current status of the base.The development of this column was five years earlier than the public's attention to the issue of the old industrial base in Northeast China since 2002. China's rural tax and fee reform was implemented on a trial basis in 2000. Most public opinion believes that this reform has lightened the burden on farmers and made a key step in rural reform.But Qin Xiaoying understands from a deeper perspective that reducing the burden on farmers does not mean solving rural problems. The real solution to rural problems is to abolish the heavy tax system imposed on farmers.

For Qin Xiaoying's bold statement, people sweated for him.He himself said, I am inferior to Li Changping on this issue. Li Changping is the former Secretary of the Party Committee of Qipan Township, Jianli County, Hubei Province. In 2000, he wrote a letter to the Premier of the State Council, reflecting that "farmers are really miserable, the countryside is really poor, and agriculture is really dangerous." This triggered a "painful and sharp reform" in the county. . In Qin Xiaoying's view, Li Changping's question is correct, but the prospects are very limited, and the solution and path are not thorough, and even a little confusing.

As early as 1979, Qin Xiaoying spent a lot of time researching African socialism.At that time, he did this kind of research not to study Africa, but to study the historical destiny of socialism in former capitalist countries. African socialism encountered serious setbacks in the late 1980s. Before that, 24 countries in Africa announced the implementation of socialist systems.Qin Xiaoying discovered in her research that African socialism has the nature of village socialism, strictly speaking, agricultural socialism. It views socialism with backward, pre-capitalist ideology, which makes people start from an impure society. A misunderstanding of socialism arose within the socialist model.

In his view, village community socialism also looks at capitalism from a backward perspective, rather than from the perspective of the working class. It is more of a moral critique of capitalism than a fundamental one. Institutional criticism.This is the root of the village socialism.In connection with the reality in China, Qin Xiaoying believes that a considerable part of Chinese socialism has the characteristics of village socialism.Because he vaguely criticized the village socialism headed by the Chinese People's Commune here, it aroused strong social concern. He realizes that the current tax and fee reform, which allows farmers to pay less money, is a good starting point, but the most important thing is to study whether the agricultural tax is right and reasonable.In his opinion, if the tax is unreasonable, it should be abolished.Because since farmers are also citizens of China, why should farmers pay agricultural taxes?Why can't farmers enjoy a unified tax system with urban residents?The tax for urban residents is personal income tax, and the tax is payable if the income exceeds 800 yuan, but few farmers can reach this level, and if they cannot reach it, they should be exempted.

If this assumption is followed, many people worry that once farmers do not pay taxes, the country's tax revenue will naturally be affected.Qin Xiaoying believes that farmers who do not farm the land can be exempted from paying taxes, but there is still so much land, and whoever farms the land pays the tax, which does not affect the country's tax revenue.Farmers leave the land freely. On the one hand, they completely get rid of the shackles of the land. On the other hand, the land also begins to be concentrated in the hands of the rich. The rich start to plan, and the industrial structure of the countryside changes. It is possible to realize efficient agriculture.

Qin Xiaoying noticed that the current pressure in rural China to a large extent not only comes from the lack of national policies, but also from the overlapping and overstaffing of national institutions at all levels. In addition, the overlapping of party and government agencies makes the government and party and government departments full of administrative personnel, which virtually increases the pressure on farmers and is not conducive to the development of the entire social economy. In connection with the current issues of rural areas, farmers, and rural social development, Qin Xiaoying pointed out sharply that people-oriented slogans are widely mentioned at present: people-oriented is definitely not based on agriculture, and it is not to resist industrialization and urbanization from the standpoint of backward production methods. populism.The real humanistic thought should be the idea of ​​promoting the free flow of labor in a unified market, and the idea of ​​liberating agriculture from the traditional model on the basis of solving the duality between urban and rural areas.He pointed out that farmers moving to cities is a choice of both disappointment and hope, and urbanization, industrialization and residentialization are the correct way out for agriculture, rural areas and farmers.Qin Xiaoying believes that if the "three rural" issues are truly resolved, then China will undergo a profound change in the political system.When the agricultural population drops below 30% of the total population, a more profound reform of the political system will come.China's marketization will irreversibly present the prospect of democratization.He called it "a millennium revolution".