Chapter 5 Enlightenment from 30 years of reform and opening up

Since 1978, the 30 years of reform and opening up have enabled China to achieve world-renowned achievements, but with the deepening of reforms, more and more problems have emerged.How to deal with these problems?What exactly did the reform and opening up benefit from?Where is China's reform headed? ◎Reporter: This year marks the 30th anniversary of reform and opening up. It can be said that the reform and opening up has reached a critical period, and people's understanding of reform and opening up has also undergone great differences.Overall, how do you evaluate our 30 years of reform and opening up?

Chen Zhiwu: For people like me who were born in the early 1960s, I have experienced and seen the reform and opening up in the past 30 years, and I have a general understanding of the situation before the reform and opening up. I happened to be graduating from high school in 1978, and I was in the period of the "Cultural Revolution" from elementary school to junior high school to high school. I think the biggest basic difference before and after the reform is that there is more and more room for individual freedom.Just like what a professor at the China University of Political Science and Law said, he said that in retrospect, the 30 years of reform and opening up is to untie the hands and feet of everyone who wants to do what they want to do, to give everyone greater freedom in their work, and to let everyone Individuals can be scholars, engineers, officials, or start a business.For example, in the rural areas in the 1980s, what farmers produced was strictly controlled and regulated.But starting from 1978 and 1979, farmers contracted production on a household-by-household basis, and you can make your own regulations on what you want to produce.Where will it be sold after production?In the beginning, the grain had to be sent to the grain station, and the pigs had to be sold to the local meat joint factory, and the state would buy them at the official price.But later these are all liberalized. What you produce, how much you produce, where you sell it, and at what price you sell it, etc., are completely liberalized.

What the professor meant was that reform is actually such a simple matter. It is to undo the shackles that stipulated that people cannot do things in all aspects in the past, and let people's desire to pursue a better life return to the original state in a more natural way.Because we live in this world as human beings, we should enjoy some of the most basic rights and freedoms.During the "Cultural Revolution", before the reform and opening up, many freedoms were taken away. Except for the freedom to find a job and the freedom to sell, there was not so much freedom in social life, such as when to get married and housing issues. .Now there is a lot of debate about real estate issues, and everyone says that housing prices are too high to afford.In my opinion, compared with China in 1978, 1979 or even before the 1990s, this problem is still a good one. It can be said to be a "disease of the rich". Everyone hopes to get better houses and improve living conditions.But it turned out that everyone didn't dare to think about it. At that time, there was only one way to get your own house, and that was to get married.

So at that time, there were many people who reluctantly got married in order to share a house.Now think about it, with the liberalization of the housing market, there is no need to marry anyone just to share a house.Many young people nowadays buy their own houses just after graduating from college or graduate school, and then find girlfriends or boyfriends after they have a house. This situation is completely different from marrying someone casually for a small house (without its own kitchen and bathroom), which has brought about a fundamental change in the personal living space. So I think it's a very interesting thing, if it started doing this in the 1970s, that is to take some random photos of people passing by on the street and see what his facial expressions reflect, and every month Take a few photos like this, and follow a time series until this year.Well, if there are such photos, everyone will see that the reform and opening up in the past few decades has not only increased the number of houses, highways, income levels, and cars, but also people's mental outlook has improved a lot.In the final analysis, these developments revolve around people.

In addition to solving people's food and clothing problems, the most important thing is that people are not just people who can live by eating, people have their own thinking ability, and they can express their spiritual world in various ways and the world of thought.So I thought it would be interesting to reconstruct this history. ◎Reporter: The 30th anniversary of reform and opening up, especially the rapid economic growth in the past few decades, as you just described, has brought about earth-shaking changes in the whole society, including everyone, so many people say it is a miracle .In your opinion, what are the main reasons for China's economic success over the past 30 years?

Chen Zhiwu: Objectively speaking, China's economic achievements include at least two main reasons: mature industrial technology and a world order conducive to free trade.This kind of development condition or opportunity comes from the world, specifically from the West, not from China. The contribution of "reform and opening up" is to allow China to join the world trend that originated outside China, allowing China to take a free ride on globalization.The reason why latecomers have an "advantage" is that this "free ride" already exists.How to understand this?

First, we see that, according to the famous British economic historian Anderson?According to Madison's estimate, it took 1880 years for the world's per capita GDP to double from the first year of AD to around 1880.However, in just 120 years, from 1880 to 2000, global per capita GDP increased nearly fivefold.In other words, the increase in per capita income achieved in the past 120 years is five times the increase achieved by humans in the nearly two thousand years before 1880.This development took place outside of China. Before China actively joined globalization, the world trend also wanted to involve China, but China either refused or reluctantly intervened.

From the 19th century to the 20th century, why has there been such a big development?By 1880, the industrial revolution had developed for more than a century and entered a new climax in an all-round way. Especially since then, electrical technology, automobile technology, aircraft technology, and telephone technology have appeared one after another. After the 1940s, computers and the Internet appeared, and production There have also been many fundamental breakthroughs in technology.Industrial manufacturing technology is becoming more and more mature, making it no problem for cross-border transplantation, and the development of transportation and communication technology makes this kind of cross-border transplantation feasible.These developments have fundamentally contributed to the rapid growth of world per capita GDP since 1880.This is an important prerequisite for China's rapid development after the "reform and opening up" in 1978. Without this industrial revolution background, there would be no achievements in China.

◎Reporter: Speaking of the contribution of this premise to China's development in the past 30 years, can you give a few examples? Chen Zhiwu: There are too many examples. Simply put, more than 80% of China's GDP comes from modern industry and service industry.For example, a CNPC company made nearly 200 billion yuan in profit last year, with a turnover of more than 800 billion yuan, contributing more than one trillion yuan to China's GDP (including indirect contributions).Think about it carefully, where does PetroChina's contribution to China's GDP come from?This trillion output would not have been possible 100 years ago.In other words, no matter how capable the late Qing government was 100 years ago, it was impossible for a large enterprise like PetroChina to emerge.As far as I know, underground oil drilling technology was first invented in Pennsylvania, USA in 1859, and the oil industry really developed on a large scale after 1900, and there was no oil industry before that.

There are several reasons.First, the automobile industry only started after 1900, and it did not develop relatively rapidly in the United States until the 1910s and 1920s.The popularity of the automobile would not have been possible without the auto industry, the abundance of private cars, and the network of highways built in the United States in the 1930s.Without the popularity of automobiles, without many private cars, the demand for oil cannot be large.The popularity of automobiles is a prerequisite for the oil industry.Second, the airplane was another driving force for the oil industry, but while the Wright Brothers made their first successful test flight in 1903, the real rise of air transport came after World War II.

In this sense, no matter how capable China was in the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China, it was impossible for a large enterprise like PetroChina to emerge.In contrast, by the time of China's "reform and opening up" in 1978, the oil industry was already very large in the world, and the degree of gasoline burning by cars, and the scale of sea and air transportation were all very high.Until then, the scale of the global auto industry, the development of the air freight industry and the scale of the oil industry, objectively speaking, had little to do with China. After 1978, large energy companies such as PetroChina, Sinopec, and CNOOC appeared in China very quickly. Now these three companies together contribute about 10% of China's GDP.The electric power industry and so on were also developed after the 19th century. ◎Reporter: There is no dispute that China's economic growth has benefited from the general trend of world development.However, people think that China's per capita GDP doubled in just 20 years from 1978 to 1998. It is considered a "miracle" that is unprecedented in the history of China and the world. Chen Zhiwu: This is of course a great achievement and deserves to be celebrated by all of us Chinese.However, we must also see its context.From 1880 to 1978, the world's per capita GDP more than tripled, while China's per capita GDP only doubled during this period, which means that China left the development opportunities brought about by the industrial revolution to after 1978.In fact, from 1950 to the present, the global per capita GDP has tripled, and China's per capita GDP has also more than tripled from 1978 to the present.In other words, it took China only 30 years to complete the growth of the world's per capita GDP in 50 years. Isn't China's speed faster?On the surface, it does.However, the level of international order and industrial technology developed 50 years ago cannot be compared with the situation 30 years ago when China started to "reform and open up". For example, software companies such as personal computers and Microsoft only appeared in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and the Internet appeared after the 1980s.These new technologies have greatly improved production capacity and production efficiency. As long as late-developing countries are willing to imitate, the more late-developing countries, the faster they can catch up.In addition, in the past 30 years, not only communication technology and transportation technology have enabled the market scope of various countries to expand globally, but also from Reagan in the United States, Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom, Gorbachev in the Soviet Union, and Deng Xiaoping in China, so Many countries have carried out privatization reforms and free trade reforms at the same time, resulting in breakthrough changes in the globalization of the market. Of course, these have accelerated China's catch-up speed, which is definitely faster than Japan and other Asian countries that chose to develop 50 years ago. Not to mention China, even UPS (Federal Express) in the United States is the same. UPS is the oldest logistics company engaged in express delivery in the United States. Just from the changes of this express logistics company, we can see the changes in development opportunities in the past 30 years . UPS was established in Seattle in 1909. Although there was some development before World War II, the scale was small. But last year, the company's sales were 49.2 billion US dollars. The growth to this level has mainly occurred in the past 30 years.Without the globalization and privatization reforms of various countries during this period, UPS's sales could not have reached this scale. From the situation of UPS, we can also see that, first, from the perspective of technological development, it was impossible for China in the late Qing Dynasty to experience the economic growth of the past 30 years, and it was impossible during the Republic of China.Second, from the perspective of changes in the international order, the same is true. Before 1914, the global trade system and world order were based on naval power. Without naval power, you cannot develop international trade.Even multinational corporations back then had to have their own navy.In other words, even if the late Qing government wanted to turn China into the world's factory, it would be impossible, because it first needed its own powerful navy.However, after World War II, the new global order is based on rules. Today, American multinational companies need many lawyers instead of a huge army.This is why Deng Xiaoping said in 1978 that China should be reformed and opened up. In the absence of a strong navy in China, international trade can be carried out immediately.The reason for this is that the maintenance of the global trade order and property rights order relies on rules, not gunboat force.Therefore, even without a powerful navy, it will not prevent China from engaging in large-scale foreign trade and turn China into the world's factory. When discussing economic growth in the past 30 years, we often only focus on China's vertical development, and look at how China today compares with the past, so of course we can see miracles.However, if we make a horizontal comparison of China's development in the past 30 years and the past 150 years in the global framework, and take into account the level of science and technology and the state of the international order during the same period, we will find that the development of the past 30 years Rather than saying it is a miracle of China, it is better to say it is a miracle brought by the world.If imitation can bring miracles to China, it just shows how powerful the science and technology developed by the West and the world order established in the past 500 years ◎Reporter: During the 30 years of reform and opening up, we have made many good decisions, but there are also many inevitable mistakes.What do you think are the major mistakes we have made in the past 30 years? Chen Zhiwu: I think if we want to talk about major mistakes, we have to go back to the debate between Mr. Yang Xiaokai and Mr. Lin Yifu at that time, that is, the issue of "advantage of latecomer" and "disadvantage of latecomer". "Late-mover advantage" refers to the fact that late-developing countries can quickly imitate technology from the first developed countries without repeating the detours that the first developed countries took. This is an advantage.And Yang Xiaokai's theory of "latecomer disadvantage" refers to the fact that latecomer countries lack the motivation to reform their own systems just because latecomer countries can easily imitate and quickly develop their economies.Just because it comes too easily and technology can replace institutional changes, there is no motivation to make changes in the fundamental system that are conducive to long-term development. As a result, the opportunity for long-term prosperity is sacrificed, and the convenience of late development has become a "disadvantage." I really wish more people would realize this. In the 1990s we missed several opportunities for fundamental political and institutional reforms. If China’s economy is to continue to grow, the reform opportunities missed in the 1980s and 1990s must now be made up, and the necessary reforms must be completed as soon as possible in China. Reform of the constitutional democratic system to correct the "disadvantage of latecomers". What I mean by this is actually very simple, because the achievements of China’s reform and opening up in the past 30 years are largely through imitation and the introduction of very mature technology, so that China can make full use of cheap labor and turn China into the factory of the world. , through our own manpower advantages, taking advantage of overall development opportunities, and taking advantage of the globalization of the world, China has achieved several times the growth of per capita GDP in 30 years. This is the latecomer advantage mentioned by Justin Yifu Lin aspect. But it is precisely because imitation allows China to develop so fast, and the total amount of development in such a short period of time is so large.From an economic point of view, sometimes if it comes too easily, it will give people an illusion that all achievements are due to ourselves, not provided by others, and it is not others who have done a lot of basic development and the world. The accumulation of aspects of the trade order provides us with the results. One of the deviant manifestations of this kind of behavior is that the credit is all their own, and the mistakes are all others. It is said that Western countries have conspiracy, jealousy, and "China threat theory", and set up various obstacles for China.This makes it easy for us not to make many institutional reforms and democratic developments that should have been done, and even draw some specious conclusions.For example, if you look at these things in the past 30 years, China’s economy has grown at a rate of nearly 10% or higher every year. It is easy to give people the impression that the existence of democracy, constitutionalism, and the rule of law has no effect on economic development. ◎Reporter: Now some people often compare China with India, saying that India is a democratic country, and they have a better foundation than us, but they are far behind us in development, so we don’t need democracy and other such things. Chen Zhiwu: I have also exchanged a lot with some scholars and friends on this point.It is precisely because generally speaking, there are inevitably deviations in behavior. For example, I used to say that no tears will be seen when the coffin is not seen, and it is indeed the case. The industrial development of Western countries in the past 200 years has brought about trade opportunities and the order of international trade. This not only provides opportunities for China, but also provides opportunities for countries such as India, Russia, and Vietnam.Why did India not take advantage of these opportunities in the late 1970s, 1980s, and early 1990s, while China took advantage of them in the late 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, and after joining the WTO in 2001?It is precisely because India has established a democratic system since its independence in 1947 that India did not experience China's three-year natural disasters in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. The Great Revolution", they have not experienced such an encounter.At that time, it was the democratic system that provided guarantees for India, so that their government officials and decision makers would not bring so many disasters to Indian society through autocracy and centralization. From this point of view, in a certain sense, the democratic system is more about maintaining stability. One of the characteristics of a democratic system is that the decision-making of a country is not decided by a few people, but by the majority of people.And people prefer stability to change, so in that case, if you want to reform people's way of life, there will be some contradictions with the democratic system. India has not experienced what happened to China either.For example, in 1980, based on actual purchasing power parity, India’s per capita GDP was about US$680, while China’s per capita GDP was about US$440-450. India’s per capita GDP was about 50% higher than China’s.Their income was higher than that of China at that time, and they had not experienced disasters, so they did not have the motivation to reform at that time. It was not until 1992 that India gave up the planned economy and carried out reform and opening up. The main reason is that China developed so fast and developed so much in the 1980s, which put a lot of pressure on India, so they did that.In contrast, China's 3 years of natural disasters, the "Cultural Revolution" and a series of other political movements have pushed Chinese society to a desperate situation, and it has also made it impossible for this society to regenerate if it does not choose fundamental reforms. It lasted. It can also be said that China is a blessing in disguise, which is a very bad thing, but human society is like this. Sometimes only when there is a crisis, there is a consensus on the so-called reform and acceptance of this change. ◎Reporter: Our reform started from the countryside at the earliest. It is a bottom-up reform. The earliest reform really brought great benefits to the countryside.But looking at it now, the situation in the countryside is not very good, such as the serious four rural problems, why does this happen? Chen Zhiwu: There are many factors involved, and I can only briefly talk about it because of time constraints.As for the problems in the countryside and the income of farmers, the only fundamental way out is to allow them to enter the cities and find non-agricultural jobs through urbanization in the future. Roughly speaking, there are two reasons: the first is obvious, and it is the limitation of the urban and rural household registration system.There are still many obstacles for people born in rural areas to enter the city and obtain urban hukou.Although it is much better than the previous years, when the real rural people go to work in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and other places today, they have no way to really settle down, and their children cannot enjoy the same benefits as urban children. treatment. These are institutional obstacles. Compared with when I was in college, the difference in education and employment between urban and rural areas is much larger than it was in 1978 and 1979.The gap in quality and opportunity makes the distance between urban and rural areas wider and wider.This is one reason why rural areas have suffered worse and worse than cities in the past 20 years. Another reason is that there is an upper limit to the development of agriculture.Because the rural areas mainly produce grain and other vegetables and food, but because each person needs 3,000 calories per day, there is an upper limit for people's requirements for food.You can find different combinations between pork, beef, chicken, fish, and vegetables, but there is still no way to exceed the upper limit of 3,000 calories. With the development of any country's economy, the proportion of agriculture in GDP will only become smaller and smaller.In the early days of reform and opening up, agriculture accounted for about 70% of China's GDP, and now it is about 15%. Agriculture is different from emerging industries such as the computer industry and search engine industry such as Baidu. Baidu has not replaced any traditional industries, and computer hardware and software have not replaced any original industries.Therefore, the contribution of these industries to GDP is a purely new contribution, a new component, and does not replace any original and established GDP component. Agriculture is a substitute, and the contribution and value produced by the non-agricultural service industry are all new contributions to a country and society.Therefore, in order to solve the problems of farmers, we need to let farmers leave the countryside and enter the cities to find non-agricultural employment. ◎Reporter: In addition to the rural reform, there is another big reform that is the reform of state-owned enterprises.The reform of state-owned enterprises is now a highly controversial reform. How do you view the loss of state-owned assets in the process of state-owned enterprise reform, the massive layoffs of enterprise employees without social security, and the sharply widening income gap between state-owned enterprise management and grassroots employees? Chen Zhiwu: Let me talk about several important aspects. First, the loss of state-owned assets has been emphasized a lot in the past few years.I think we must emphasize a basic premise, which is why we want to reform China's system and economic system, including the reform of privatization and privatization of state-owned enterprises.One of the most important reasons is to reform the efficiency of state-owned enterprises.Everyone knows that it is human nature not to feel bad about spending other people's money.But the second is very important, that is, under the original state-owned system, we will think about a basic problem.In the past 100 years, it has been tested in many countries. Public ownership is accompanied by loss of control of power. Why do these two always appear at the same time? I think power is out of control, and economic production is state-owned and public-owned. If this state is used as the starting point for reform, the process of reform will inevitably lead to the loss of state-owned assets, black-box operations, and corruption. The reason we want to reform is because in the previous state, there were no checks and balances on power, no reliable checks, no democratic checks, and no news media checks. All the public ownership countries that need to be reformed have no reliable and legal checks on power. restrict. The reason for reform is to change this state, because reform is to change the state of unrestricted power, so this process must be a black box operation, at least there will be a considerable part of unrestricted power, in the middle of privatization and privatization play a very large role. Because in a certain sense, it is necessary to rely on the existing power, from the original unrestricted power state of the public ownership system to the privatized private system, so that the legal system can play a role.This transformation must be carried out in a state where power cannot be controlled.At this time, corruption, black-box operations, bribery, and loss of state assets are inevitable. Reforms in Russia are bad because they created a lot of oligarchs and a lot of deals behind the scenes.This does not appear to be the case in China.But we have so many complaints now, which shows that it is not that there is no such situation, but that it is manifested in a different form.Therefore, whether it is Russia's reform or China's reform, from a state of uncontrolled power to a state of supervision, no matter how it is done, it will cause some black-box operations and bribery. Unless the way of reform can be like that of the Czech Republic, where all state-owned assets and fixed assets controlled by the government are put into a fund, and everyone gets shares in the fund or privatization tickets to buy their favorite companies, It is completely transparent per capita, as long as the citizens of this country get the same number of shares.Only by operating in this way can it be transparent. Whether it is a Russian-style operation or a Chinese-style operation, it is difficult to achieve this. Of course, when I say this, I don’t mean to defend some people who are profiting from the privatization process. I just want to realize what should be done in such a transformation process, because the results have already been seen, and the state will be better than the past. a lot of.In the middle of this process, because the starting point is that way, it is inevitable that such problems will arise. ◎Reporter: In the past, we had a direction of reform that was to retreat from the country and advance to the people. I remember that in the 1990s, Mr. Wu Jinglian had a project that was dedicated to this.But the current situation may be just the opposite. Private enterprises are getting more and more difficult to live, and the profits of a few monopoly state-owned enterprises may account for the vast majority of the profits of national enterprises.why?What does this mean for our economy and society? Chen Zhiwu: In my opinion, this is not surprising at all. It is also an important manifestation of Yang Xiaokai's "disadvantage of latecomer".Because if you think about it, as long as there are state-owned enterprises in any industry, the space for private enterprises and private enterprises in that industry will become smaller and smaller, and the legal system will inevitably become more and more difficult. The reason is very simple.The characteristic of the legal system is that everyone is equal before the legal system. If one is a state-owned enterprise, the shareholder behind it is the state, and the other is a private enterprise, and the shareholder behind it is a private individual. When these two parties appear in front of the court, who can get better? How much protection?This goes without saying. Under such circumstances, I have been emphasizing in the past few years that whether state-owned enterprises should be privatized or not is not only related to whether state-owned enterprises are more efficient or private enterprises are more efficient, but also depends on whether a person spends his own money Whether it is more distressing or spending other people's money is more distressing. This issue is very important, and it has also been the focus of discussions on state-owned enterprise reform in the past 30 years. In addition to this factor, there are many other very important and far-reaching influences.For example, these state-owned enterprises and state-owned assets are all privatized or privatized, withdrawing from many economic fields of the country, and allowing the people to come in through the state retreat.If this is not done, then in the end, the legal system of various industries and the legal system of the whole society will be difficult to develop.After the privileged enterprises come in, the life of real private enterprises and private enterprises will be hard to live.In addition, it will impose great constraints on the economic structure, industrial structure, and economic growth model of the entire country. I have also written some articles recently. If the state controls the main resources, assets and wealth of Chinese society, and at the same time mainly enjoys the distribution of these resources exclusively by the state, if all taxes are handed over to the government, it will only further strengthen the government in the end. The monopoly position among China's economic decision-making, consumption decision-making, and investment decision-making.At the same time, it will weaken the control power of private economic decision-making.This will produce an inevitable result, that is, let China's economic growth continue to rely on investment rather than consumption.Because consumption is private consumption, if you want ordinary people to consume, you must first give them more wealth. If there is no wealth, how can consumption increase? If the state-owned enterprises are still allowed to play the leading role in the Chinese economy and retain their monopoly status, the further growth of the Chinese economy can only rely on investment, high pollution, and heavy industrial projects. However, this growth model is now facing more and more challenges, especially under the current environment and trend of global economic recession, the model of relying on investment and relying on exports to drive economic growth may have been possible in the past 30 years, but in the past 30 years There will be more and more obstacles in the future, and sustainability is also an issue. ◎Reporter: We just talked about a society ruled by law.The market economy can be said to be an economy ruled by law, and we have been emphasizing the establishment of a society ruled by law, but the current situation does not seem to be optimistic.What is it that restricts the establishment of a society ruled by law?What can we do to truly build a society ruled by law? Chen Zhiwu: The core basis of a society ruled by law is to allow the vast majority of people in the society to have more income and more wealth, so that we have everything.If we all have nothing but the state owns everything, we will be forced to live and beg for food from the power of the state.At this time, if each of us is passive and in the position of begging the country and the government, each of us will not take up legal weapons to protect ourselves.Because when you want to use legal weapons to protect yourself, the first thing is the threat from power. The power is in the hands of the government, and the government controls our jobs, so how can you use legal weapons to demand yourself? Benefit? So from this logic, as long as a country's main economic revenue is in the hands of the state and the government, the development of the rule of law in this country will be very difficult. These years, I originally wanted to retreat from the state and advance to the people, but with the establishment of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, not only did the state-owned enterprises not withdraw from more competitive industries, but the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission further consolidated and expanded its power.So not only did the country retreat and the people advance, but the country advanced and the people retreated in reverse, which is to lay the foundation for the second nationalization. At this time, the further advancement of the state and the retreat of the people will allow the state to further occupy a monopoly position in various fields. This is a fundamental challenge to China's legal system construction, and it is also a retrogression in a sense. According to my calculations, state-owned assets now account for 60% to 70% of the productive wealth of the entire society, that is, 3/4 of the wealth is controlled by the state, and only 1/4 is controlled by the people. Such a control structure is very important for the rule of law. The development of the society, the respect of people's rights, and the protection of personal space are all very detrimental. ◎Reporter: When we talk about reforms in China, there is another topic that cannot be avoided, that is, the reforms of education, medical care, and housing systems. These reforms may also be the most criticized reforms.What do you think about this problem? Chen Zhiwu: Under the premise that the current government revenue is not too small, the growth rate of government revenue is faster than that of anyone or any group.Against such a background, the government originally had a lot of money to fully cover the cost of compulsory education for all Chinese people. But the actual situation is that in the absence of a system of substantive democratic supervision of power and budget, although the country spends a lot of money every year, it actually invests very little money in social security, education, medical care, etc. .For example, last year the government spent only 600 billion yuan on social security, medical care and employment security, accounting for only 15% of the country's fiscal expenditure and 2.4% of the annual GDP. 3% of an average worker's annual income).In the United States, which has no state-owned economy, the expenditure on the same three items is about 1.5 trillion U.S. dollars, which is equivalent to 61% of the total federal government expenditure and 11.5% of the U.S. GDP. equivalent to one-sixth of the annual income of the average American). So far, the Chinese government's budget has basically been worked out in a black box, rather than the result of extensive, transparent and open deliberation and discussion by the media and society, especially the National People's Congress.Therefore, under such circumstances, the government has so much money that it can completely solve the problem of 9-year compulsory education.In addition, medical care should protect the lowest level. Discussions on medical reform have been very intense in recent years. Generally speaking, some fields of education can be marketized, but others cannot.For example, compulsory education cannot be marketized. In addition to the kindergartens, primary schools, and middle schools provided by the state, there are also private schools that are now very popular. The state must provide guarantees for the 9-year compulsory education, but education providers must have competition between private and government-run institutions in order to further reform educational content and methods.Undergraduate, postgraduate, vocational education, EMBA, etc. should be more market-oriented. Not only is there no need for the state to regulate this aspect, but the whole education should be more open and more active, teaching Chinese students how to innovate and how to Be creative, have independent thinking, and the ability to think about change, instead of just pursuing test scores like now. As a result of the excessive regulation of education by the education department, many things will inevitably be standardized, so that students in various places learn the same content and receive the same guidance. Everyone in the whole society is like a machine, which is contrary to the development of the whole society. of. ◎Reporter: The reform has been carried out to this day, if it continues to deepen, it will inevitably damage the interests of those with vested interests.Now, only those with vested interests have the ability to continue to promote reform, so it can be said that the promoters of reform are the biggest resistance to reform, so every step forward in reform is very difficult.Moreover, many reforms now are still carried out by those with vested interests using the public power in their hands to seek greater benefits for themselves in the name of reforms. This is actually a retrogression.How can this impasse be broken?This raises another question, that is, where should our reform go? Chen Zhiwu: Actually, I think the biggest driving force for reform may come from the media and society including the Internet, rather than vested interest groups within the system.因为到目前为止，我知道很多的朋友，特别是年轻人，包括一些学者都会说中国有没有民主不是那么重要，法治也不是很重要。像刚才说的，过去30年没有这些东西也发展得很快。所以很多人会有错觉，觉得民主不民主、法治不法治，对于发展的问题、生存的问题、生活的文化都没有什么影响。 但很遗憾的是，一方面因为现在对权力的制约体系并没有真正成型，所以我们看到去年政府财政收入增长了31%。而今年到目前来看，根据我所了解的一些情况，有可能国家财政收入相对于去年会增长40%，甚至是50%。 所以，行政部门的征税权不受任何制约。跟其他发达国家不一样的是，在民主宪政的国家里面，征税权一般是被控制在国家的立法机构手中的，这样在增加新的税种或者是调高税率的时候，必须是由老百姓选举产生的议员投票通过才可以。 但在中国不一样，似乎很多部门都可以随意增加税种、调高税率，当然也有一些学者帮着他们找借口增长各种各样的税收名义和品种。 但是，这样做以后没有几个人真的去问，政府拿到这么多的税收以后在干什么，是不是政府每收上去1块钱又给民间社会回馈1块钱的服务，带来1块钱的好处？ 我知道好多搞经济学研究的人总喜欢说，政府征税的话是为了实现第二次分配、为了实现转移支付。这些听起来都非常不错，但是我们很多同仁都忘记了，你要通过征税来实现第二次分配、实现转移支付的时候必须要有一个前提，就是这些税征上来以后是怎么样花的，有没有一个公开透明的财政预算过程，人民选出的代表在这些钱到底怎么样花的时候到底有没有发言权，是不是会把每1块钱的税收都花到该花的地方？ 如果没有办法实现真正合理的、受到监督的第二次分配和转移支付的话，这些钱收上来只是给一些人违规操作、腐败提供了更大的空间，如豪华的政府办公大楼、更豪华的汽车等。如果以不同名义征收的税都是做这些事情的话，老百姓没有理由多付那么多的钱。 现在很多人说中国必须要推出物业税，就是张三、李四买了一栋房子，价值是20万也好、30万也好、100万也好、300万也好，都要按照一定的比例让政府每年从你房子的价值里面拿走5%、10%、20%或更多。这个时候我们就要问自己，政府征收物业税以后我们得到的是什么，我们的付出跟政府回馈到我们手里面的、回馈到整个社会里面的服务和好处是不是相配？如果不相配的时候，特别是我们得不到任何服务的时候，任何1块钱的税都是太多了。 在这种情况下，我希望更多的人可以给中国老百姓帮一个忙，就是不要随便提出征物业税等税，如果再这样的话，在没有任何方式保证大家交了这么多税后国家可以给社会回馈相对这么多的服务和公共产品、方方面面的便利、社会福利的话，还不如不收，因为你这样做是给整个社会帮了倒忙。 我觉得一旦更多的老百姓看到越来越不受制约的权力，把本来属于他们的收入、属于他们的财富，以各种名义征到国家手里面，自己也没有得到什么东西的时候，更多的人对此就会有清醒的认识。 现在交通这么发达，经济这么发达，所有的权力都可以调动任何资源为他们所用。而像以前的皇帝，虽然他们的权力也不受制约，但是很多事情想要做也不可能，他们没有现在的这些交通运输工具，让他们把喜欢的东西都搬到想要搬到的任何地方，他们是做不到的。所以权力的概念就不是抽象的了，而是非常具体的，是涉及每个老百姓的权利能不能受到保护的问题了。 所以说，权力制约、民主宪政不是什么抽象的东西，而是会牵扯到每个人的腰包，每天的工作、每个月的工作、每年的工作可以带回去多少收入，还有房子几年以后是真正属于你的，这些问题涉及目前绝大多数的老百姓。因此在这种情况下，不管最后的既得利益者愿意也好、不愿意也好，我觉得互联网和传统媒体，还有那么多有良知的学者和其他的业界人士，大家都会从不同的方面把问题讲出来、挖掘出来，这样的话即使是一些既得利益群体不愿意作出根本性的让中国社会持续发展、稳定增长、同时又可以真正实现和谐社会的基础性改革，那样的改革也是不可避免的。 500年以前几乎没有任何一个国家有运作很好的权力制衡制度。17世纪末期，权力制衡运作比较好的是英国。后来到18世纪末期，也在美国出现了。但是其他的西欧国家、其他的现代民主国家，基本上是在19世纪后半期、20世纪发展起来的。 所以一方面我们看到中国的权力被滥用让我们感到很难受，同时我们很多人会说在中国要实现民主宪政，不管是中国文化传统的问题还是现状的问题，都让人觉得很悲观。但是我并不悲观，当我们看到世界范围内除了少数几个国家是在19世纪后半期之前就建立了民主宪政体系的之外，绝大多数今天的民主宪政国家都是在19世纪后半期、尤其是第二次世界大战以后建立起来的。所以就这个情况来看，中国也只是一个时间的问题，不是说会不会出现民主宪政，而只是一个时间的问题。