【編按】目前流行的「初次分配靠市場，二次分配靠政府，三次分配靠社會」的說法，是如何促進「共同富裕」的設想，然實際上這樣的說法多有不足。這篇文章透過解讀2015年北京中央首提的「供給側結構性改革」，2020年首提的「雙循環」和2021年8月17日北京中央財經委員會會議提出的「共同富裕」綱領，試圖引發對「共同富裕」內涵更深入的探討。這篇文章嘗試指出，「共同富裕」需於供給側和需求側同時發力：從供給側來看，共同富裕要求「包容性增長」（如面向中小企業的普惠金融和數字紅利的城鄉共享），而從需求側來看，共同富裕要求在「二次分配」上削減不必要的收入和財產的不平等。本文轉載自實驗主義治理，感謝作者崔老師授權，崔之元為北京清華大學公共管理學院教授。圖片取自微博。（文末附上英文版本供參）。
2021年8月17日，習近平總書記主持召開中央財經委員會第十次會議，強調在「高質量發展中促進共同富裕」，引發了國內外輿論的廣泛關注。根據新華社報導，「會議指出，要堅持以人民為中心的發展思想，在高質量發展中促進共同富裕，正確處理效率和公平的關係，構建初次分配、再分配、三次分配協調配套的基礎性制度安排，加大稅收、社保、轉移支付等調節力度並提高精準性，擴大中等收入群體比重，增加低收入群體收入，合理調節高收入，取締非法收入，形成中間大、兩頭小的橄欖型分配結構，促進社會公平正義，促進人的全面發展，使全體人民朝著共同富裕目標紮實邁進」。
目前社會上比較流行的對中央這次會議的「共同富裕」綱領的解讀是一句話：「初次分配靠市場，二次分配靠政府，三次分配靠社會」。本文認為，這句話不能體現「共同富裕」綱領的深刻內涵。先來看「初次分配靠市場」這一說法的不足。
世界上的「市場經濟」並無統一的製度安排。德國的「社會市場經濟」賦予職工多於英美的「股東至上主義」的參與企業管理和分配決定的權利。中國的「社會主義市場經濟」中出現了華為員工持股的著名案例。1990年，華為首次提出員工持股的概念，當時職工參股的價格為每股10元，華為稅後利潤的15%作為股權分紅。2001年，華為推出「虛擬受限股」改革，此類「虛擬股票」享有一定分紅權和股價升值權，但不能轉讓和出售，離職時即失效。這和西班牙「蒙德拉貢合作社」的「職工內部資本賬戶」概念有一些共同點[1]。2008年，華為進一步給所有工齡一年以上的職工配股，每股4．04元，如果員工沒有足夠現金來購買股票，華為以公司名義向銀行提供擔保，使得職工貸款購買股票。2013年，華為又實施了「時間單位計劃」（TUP，Time-Based Unit Plan），這是一項以5年為一個週期的對中外職工都適用的利潤分享計劃[2]。華為這一制度安排，屬於「初次分配」，但顯然不能用籠統的「靠市場」來解釋。正如《哈佛商學評論》的一篇文章認為，華為選擇員工持股和利潤分享，是任正非的公平和效率相統一的理念所致[3]。實際上，華為的員工持股制度（任正非本人至今只佔華為總股份的1．4%）是在「初次分配」上也兼顧效率與公平的「共同富裕」的成功案例。
再來看「二次分配靠政府」說法的不足。我們不妨舉一個西方的例子。《二十一世紀資本論》的作者皮凱蒂建議用「年度財產稅」和「遺產稅」來給每個年滿25歲的公民一次性發放「公民資本禀賦」。這可以被理解為「社會化的遺產繼承製度」或「土地改革的普遍化」（土地改革旨在使土地佔有更平等化，但皮凱蒂認為其邏輯不限於土地）。具體來說，「公民資本禀賦」的數額可以定為成年人平均財產的60%，目前美國，歐洲和日本的成年人平均財產是20萬歐元，所以每個年滿25歲的公民可以獲得一次性「公民資本禀賦」12萬歐元。皮凱蒂認為，這是使資本社會化和臨時化，加強其在代際內和代際間的流動性的重要步驟[4]。但皮凱蒂這個「二次分配」方案能否簡單地「靠政府」而實現呢？答案顯然是否定的。任何「二次分配」方案都是各種政治社會力量（包括階級，政黨，利益集團，公民運動等）的衝突和妥協的結果。
「三次分配靠社會」的說法也過於籠統。慈善事業的發展，既和「遺產稅」 （屬於「二次分配」）有關，又和社會精神生活緊密相聯。「聖經」的「馬太福音」裡有一段影響深遠的耶穌的名言：「我實在告訴你們：財主進天國是難的。我又告訴你們，駱駝穿過針的眼，比財主進神的國還容易呢」。奧古斯丁在擔任希波主教的35年裡（公元396-430），曾做了六千多次佈道，反復強調和論證富人進天國比駱駝穿過針眼還難，除非富人最後放棄財富。當時的富人信徒紛紛請專業的速記員來記錄奧古斯丁說的每一句話[5]。當然不是只有基督教信徒才會做慈善捐贈。中國的「儒商」傳統也會對富人有一定壓力作用，但其強度可能沒有「富人進天國比駱駝穿過針眼還難」那樣大。總之，在自願基礎上的「第三次分配」，和一個社會的精神生活密切相關，特別是和相關人士的價值觀有關，不是籠統的「靠社會」的說法可以說明的。據英國「經濟學人」雜誌2021年11月20日報導，亞馬遜創始人Jeff Bezos（他擁有亞馬遜16%的股份，和任正非擁有華為1.4%的股份形成反差）的前妻小說家Mackenzie Scott（目前是世界第22位富人）成為近來捐贈額度最大，速度最快的慈善家，在2020年7月到2021年7月間，她給780個組織捐款85億美元。她這樣做的重要原因之一是認為美聯儲的量化寬鬆政策使得富者越富（她本人2019年離婚時的股票價值356億美元，但2020年該股票已升值為620億美元）很不合理，因此她加大加快捐贈。這是說明「第三次分配」要靠特定價值觀（而非籠統的「靠社會」）的最新例子[6]。
既然「初次分配靠市場，二次分配靠政府，三次分配靠社會」這一流行說法有很多不足，怎樣的解讀才能體現「共同富裕」綱領的深刻內涵呢？本文認為，2015年中央首提的「供給側結構性改革」，2020年首提的「雙循環」和2021年8月17日中央財經委員會會議提出的「共同富裕」綱領三者之間有著內在的邏輯關係，實際上形成了一個「新三位一體」，而這正是「共同富裕」綱領的深刻內涵所在。
習近平總書記在2016年1月18日的中央黨校講話「推進供給側結構性改革」中說，「從國內看，經濟發展面臨四降一升，即經濟增速下降，工業品價格下降，實體企業盈利下降，財政收入下降，經濟風險發生概率上升。這些問題的主要矛盾不是周期性的，而是結構性的，供給結構錯配問題嚴重。需求管理邊際效益不斷遞減，單純依靠刺激內需難以解決產能過剩等結構性矛盾。因此，必須把改善供給結構作為主攻方向，實現由低水平供需平衡向高水平供需平衡躍升」[7]。顯然，供給側結構性改革的提出，是針對「單純依靠刺激內需」的凱恩斯主義的宏觀政策，這表明中國實踐已經看到西方「凱恩斯主義」的不足。
習近平總書記首次提出「雙循環」是在2020年5月23日看望參加全國政協十三屆三次會議的經濟界委員時，他說：「面向未來，我們要把滿足國內需求作為發展的出發點和落腳點，加快構建完整的內需體系……，逐步形成以國內大循環為主體、國內國際雙循環相互促進的新發展格局」。
這個「建立完整的內需體系」的提法很有新意，也是 「雙循環」的重點，這表明中國實踐也超越了西方經濟學的「供應學派」。
在此，哈佛大學法學院龐德法理學講座教授昂格爾（Roberto Unger）在2019年出版的《知識經濟》一書或許對我們理解中國2008-2021年宏觀經濟政策演變有所啟發。昂格爾認為，經濟增長需要不斷突破供給約束和需求約束。但打破這兩類約束的過程既是「不連續」的（discontinuous），又是「不自主」 （heteronomous）的[8]。「不連續」是指突破一個供給或需求約束並不自發保證還能突破下一個約束。以需求約束為例：美國2007-2008年 「次貸危機」前的家庭債務擴張，未嘗不是突破需求約束的一種方法，但它不自動保證達到突破需求約束的下一個（更好的）的方法（例如，通過累進所得稅和社會公共支出來擴大需求）。「不自主」是指需求擴張和供給擴張之間沒有自發的對應關係。例如，即便需求擴張從家庭債務轉到了累進所得稅和社會公共支出，也並不能保證供給可以自發地從沒有技術創新轉到有技術創新。
凱恩斯已經註意到供給擴張不能自動創造需求擴張。在1936年出版的劃時代的《就業，利息和貨幣通論》中，凱恩斯深刻批判了所謂「供給創造自己的需求」的「薩伊定律」。1939年，在《就業，利息和貨幣通論》的法譯本序言中，凱恩斯甚至用一句話概括自己的學說：「在生產理論上徹底和薩伊定律決裂，在利率理論上回到孟德斯鳩」[9]。但昂格爾強調，凱恩斯沒有註意到需求擴張也不能自動創造供給擴張，因此凱恩斯的理論並非「通論」，而仍然是特例。從這一視角，我們可以把中國決策層2015年提出「供給側結構性改革」理解為認識到2008年以來的需求擴張並不能自動帶來供給擴張，而2020年「雙循環」新戰略裡的「把滿足國內需求作為發展的出發點和落腳點，加快構建完整的內需體系」，則是認識到供給擴張也不能自動帶來需求擴張。因此，「供給側結構性改革」和「構建完整的內需體系」不是相互對立的，而是需要用不斷的製度創新和技術創新來突破供給約束和需求約束。
當然，認識到這一點並不意味著我們已經在實踐上很好地結合了「供給側改革」和「需求側管理」。但中國決策層和經濟理論界至少已經不像西方主流宏觀經濟學那樣，把「供給側改革」和「需求側管理」對立起來。例如，中國一個重要的智庫最近提出「十四五規劃」可以從「1+3+2」的結構性潛能框架來理解。「1」是指以都市圈，城市群為龍頭，為下一步中國的中速高質量發展打開空間。「3」是指實體經濟上補三大短板：一是基礎產業領域仍然存在不同程度的行政性壟斷，競爭不足；二是中等收入群體規模不大，力爭在今後15年內，使中等收入人群從4億增加到9億人；三是基礎研發能力不強，這是我們「內循環」中的「卡脖子」環節。「2」是指「數字經濟」和「綠色發展」，這是全球性且中國具備一定優勢的新增長潛能。概括來說，「1+3+2」結構性潛能「就是一個龍頭引領，補足三大短板，兩個翅膀賦能」。[10]值得注意的是，在這個「1+3+2」的構想裡，「供給側結構性改革」和「構建完整的內需體系」是緊密結合在一起的。
在梳理了「供給側結構性改革」和「雙循環」裡「構建完整的內需體系」的互不替代又相互促進的關係之後，我們就可以更深刻的把握「共同富裕」綱領的意義：「共同富裕」的要義恰恰是在供給側和需求側同時發力。從供給側來看，共同富裕要求「包容性增長」。「包容性」一詞出現在新華社對2021年8月17日中央財經委員會會議的新聞通稿中，因為只有「包容性的增長方式」（如面向中小企業的普惠金融和數字紅利的城鄉共享），才能在「初次分配」上向「共同富裕」邁進。從需求側來看，共同富裕要求在「二次分配」上削減不必要的收入和財產的不平等。我們可以從政治哲學家羅爾斯的「正義論」來理解什麼是「不必要的不平等」。羅爾斯（John Rawls）的「正義論」中的「差異原則」是指：資源和機會應該平等配置，不平等只有在有利於社會中的弱勢群體時才是必要的，否則就應該削減不平等。這個「差異原則」背後的直覺非常簡單：不平等對強勢群體總是有利的，只有當它對弱勢群體也是有利之時（如科學技術創新者的收入高一些），才對社會整體有利，使得社會得以超越「在貧困中的平等」 （或中國以前的「吃大鍋飯」）。正因為如此，連「新自由主義」的主要代表之一哈耶克也自稱同意羅爾斯的「差異原則」。然而，由於羅爾斯沒有對不平等給弱勢群體帶來的影響做定量分析，導致哈耶克可以聲稱非常巨大的不平等也是對弱勢群體有利的。而皮凱蒂的定量研究則證明，處於西方財產分佈底層的50%人群的財產佔比過去一個世紀以來沒有變化，一直是5%-10%，這就說明當前的財產分配狀況是不符合羅爾斯的差異原則的，存在著大量的不必要的不平等。削減不必要的收入和財產不平等，對於擴大內需具有重要意義（因為窮人的邊際消費傾向高於富人），是建立新華社會議通稿中所說「兩頭小，中間大的橄欖型分配結構」的關鍵政策工具之一。
本文從「供給側結構性改革」，「雙循環」
（以「構建完整的內需體系」為重點）和「共同富裕」的「新三位一體」視角，對2021年8月17日中央財經委員會的「共同富裕」綱領提出了一種新的解讀，求教於各位讀者，以期引發進一步的學術探討。
註腳：
[1] 漢克．托馬斯，克里斯．勞甘《蒙德拉貢：對現代工人合作制的經濟分析》，上海三聯書店，1991年。
[2] 華為員工持股和利潤分享的詳細情況，可參見「玖零管理研究院」微信公號以及「華為年報 2019」。
[3] “HUAWEI：A Case Study of When Profit Share Works”, https://hbr.org/2015/09/huawei-a-case-study-of-when-profit-sharing-works.
[4] 詳見《澎湃新聞》〈崔之元讀皮凱蒂〉，https://m.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_8955837。
[5] 彼得．布朗，《穿過針眼：財富，西羅馬帝國的衰亡和基督教會的形成350-550年》下卷，第589頁，社科文獻出版社，2021。
[6] 感謝劉岩提醒我注意這個案例。
[7] 習近平，《談治國理政》第二卷，第254頁。
[8] Roberto Unger, The Knowledge Economy, Verso, 2019, pp. 191-193.
[9] The Collected Writings of John Maynard Keynes, Vol. VII, Cambridge University Press, 2013, pp. xxiv.
[10] 劉世錦主編，《讀懂十四五：新發展格局下的改革議程》，中信出版集團，2021，第VI頁。
The New Trinity: Supply Side Reform, Dual Circulation and Common Prosperity
by Zhiyuan CUI
On August 17, 2021, The Chinese Communist Party’s Central Fiscal and Economic Committee hold its Tenth meeting. The key message of this meeting’s public announcement is to “promote common prosperity in the process of high-quality development”. This generates the competing interpretations both domestically and internationally. In light of the recent tightening of regulations of high-tech companies such Alibaba and Didi, some view the talking of “common prosperity” as a sign of China’s returning to the Maoist era by repressing private entrepreneurship. The others see it differently. For them, the antitrust regulation against some of high-tech companies are long over-due, and the announcement of “common prosperity” as a new policy orientation indicates that China is moving out of the Chinese version of the Gilded Age and toward a Chinese equivalent of the American Progressive Era.
Without denying there may be elements of truth in the above two contrasting perspectives, I want to emphasize in the short essay that there is an internal logic running from Supply Side Reform and Dual Circulation to Common Prosperity. Simply put, both Say’s law (supply-side reform) and Keynes’ Logic of domestic demand management (Dual Circulation) are incomplete, and Common Prosperity is proposed to work on both supply as well as demand side simultaneously.
Let’s start with the notion of “supply side reform”. Using Baidu word search, we cannot find any match of the word “supply side”(供给侧) before November 11, 2015. Wu Jinglian, a prominent economist in China, thinks the Chinese translation of Masahiko Aoki’s 2015 article “The New Normal of the Chinese Economy from the Perspective of Comparative Economics” first used the word “supply side reform”1, since the Japanese language has the “side” translated as “侧”。But I consider more likely that the G20 Summit of 2014 when Australia was the president may have more direct influence in the Chinese use of the word of “supply side reform”, because the G20 “Brisbane Action Plan” adopted in November 2014 explicitly called for a series of “supply side reforms” of each member country in order to raise the level of world output by 2 percent by 2018. 2 Whatever the sources of the Chinese term of “supply side reform”, it clearly addresses the problems of huge demand stimulation policy adopted in 2009 as a response to the global financial crisis of 2007-2008.
As Wu Jinglian emphasized, “aggregate demand has three components, namely consumption demand, investment demand and net export demand”, and “the dominant approach of post-2009 Chinese macroeconomic policy is demand management”. However, he and many other Chinese economists came to believe this Keynesian short-term demand management approach does not solve the deep structural problems of the Chinese economy. Wu Jinglian went so far as to claim that “it is wrong to use the Keynesian short-term analytical method to deal with the long-term problems of China”3.
On May 9, 2016, The People Daily interviewed an unnamed “authoritative figure” on the “supply side structural reform” who stressed “Three Reductions, One Lowering and One Improving”( “三去一降一补”). The meaning of this slogan is to reduce inventory, reduce over-capacity and deleveraging, lowering costs and “improving the weak links of production”(补短板). The point of supply side structural reform is to enhance the efficiency of capital and labor inputs, rather than simply to maintain high growth rate by stimulating investment, consumption and net export demands.
Some Western commentators viewed the Chinese supply side reform as Reagan’s echo4. This view is provocative enough that President Xi Jinping himself offered a rebuttal. In his speech to the Central Party School, Xi said that “the Western supply school stresses supply will automatically create its own demand” and this has nothing to do with the Chinese supply side structural reform5. Everyone familiar with the history of economic thought would immediately recognizes that the phrase “supply will automatically create its own demand” refers to the so-called “Say’s Law”. This “law” is so important that Keynes defines his “The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money” as against “Say’s Law”6.
According to Thomas Sowell, there are 6 versions of Say’s Law. The 6th version states that “Disequilibrium in the economy can exist only because the internal proportions of output differ from consumers’ preferred mix—not because output is excessive in the aggregate”7. Judging by this 6th version, there are still some flavors of Say’s Law in the Chinese thinking of supply side reform, since it is quite common in the policy documents to read sayings like “there is no insufficient demands, but only that the change of supply does not follow quickly enough the change of demand” — in other words, the problem is mix, rather than aggregate. But overall speaking, it is fair to say that the Chinese supply side reform is not inspired by Say’s Law.
This leads us to an interesting observation. The Chinese policy makers and economists in the inner circle seem to realize the limitations of both Keynesian demand management and supply side reform based on Say’s Law. Maybe they come to the same conclusions independently as Roberto Unger of Harvard Law School:
“Breakthroughs of the constraints on demand and on supply are heteronomous. By this I mean that no automatic correspondence exists between an advance from one basis for the expansion of demand or supply and a corresponding advance on the other side, of supply or demand. It does not follow from an advance in supporting demand, from one basis for such an advance to another basis (for example, from increasing purchasing power by encouraging household debt to increasing it through progressive taxation and social spending), that we will achieve a corresponding advance on the supply side of the economy (for example, from an expansion of supply without productivity-enhancing innovations to one with them)”8.
From this line of thinking, it is not a surprise to find out that the new development strategy of “Dual Circulation” returns to the domestic demand management again in 2020. Let’s look at the context how the “Dual Circulation” was proposed. On April 17,2020, the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party held a meeting in which a new policy of “six protections ” (六保) has been announced. In fighting against the adverse economic consequences of Covid-19, the Politburo said, the first priority is to protect people’s employment. The other five protections are: protecting people’s basic livelihood, protecting market entities (avoiding too much bankruptcies), protecting food and energy security, protecting supply chain of industries and protecting the functioning of the local society. At the same day, the Chinese State Statistical Bureau published the data of the 2020 first quarter GDP growth rate—negative 6.8%. It was the first time the growth rate turned negative in China since 1976. Obviously, the more aggressive measures to fight Covid-19 are called for. It may not be an accident that the Politburo meeting and the State Statistical Bureau’s announcement was held in the same day.
On April 20, the State Statistical Bureau published another set of data. The important thing to notice is that urban employment declined by 6% in China in the first quarter of 2020. In 2019, the Chinese urban employment population was 440 million, so the 6% decline means 26.4 million people exited from labor market due to Covid-19. These people are most rural migrant workers who returned to the countryside since they could not work in the cities during Covid-19. Technically, they are not counted as “unemployed”, but obviously they should be a main concern for achieving the “first protection” (namely, protecting employment) goal of the Politburo.
On May 23, 2020, Xi visited the delegation of members of the economic affairs of the 13th Political Consultative Conference and announced that “satisfying domestic demand is the starting and the ending points, we must speed up constructing a complete domestic demand system”.
On the surface of it, the “dual circulation” (domestic and international circulations, with the main focus on domestic) seems to return to the 2009 style Keynesian demand management. But if the above analysis is correct, the Chinese decision makers have realized that no automatic mutual adjustment of demand and supply. Both Say’s Law and the Keynesian short-term demand management are insufficient. Supply does not create its own demand, and demand does not create its own supply. We need a continuous process of institutional and policy innovations to break the constraints of supply and demand.
From this perspective, we can see the inner logic linking Common Prosperity with supply side reform and dual circulation: Common Prosperity has crucial effects on both supply and demand sides. On the supply side, the point of common prosperity is to promote inclusive growth: to enlarge the access to economic resources and opportunities of the mass (for example, to enlarge the access to credits to small and medium sized enterprises). On the demand side, by reducing the unnecessary income and wealth inequality the consumption demand of the mass will be increased9. Thus, the trinity may be emerging: Supply Side Reform, Dual Circulation and Common Prosperity.
1.Wu Jinglian, Preface to “三去一降一补：深化供给侧结构性改革”（中信出版集团，2017），第 VI 页。The Chinese translation of Aoki’s paper appears in the journal “比较”,No.77, March 2015.
2.David Vines, “On Concerted Unilateralism: Raising the Global Growth Rate through Macroeconomic Policy Coordination”， Asia Pacific Journal of Economic Literature, 2015
3.Wu Jinglian, ibid, p.V.
4.“Reagan’s Chinese Echo?”, The Economist, February 2016.
5.“习近平谈治国理政“第二卷，第251页。
6.In his Preface to the French edition of “The General Theory”, Keynes states that “it is a final break away from the doctrines of J.B.Say”.
7.Thomas Sowell, “Classical Economics Reconsidered”
8.Roberto M. Unger, “The Knowledge Economy”, Verso, 2019, P.193
9.See Thomas Piketty, “Capital and Ideology”, Harvard University Press, 2019.
