One view is that the so-called public finance is market finance, which refers to the distribution activities or economic activities of the state or government to provide public services for the market. It is a financial type or model that adapts to the market economy. The essence of government finance under market economy is market economy finance, which is called "market finance" for short. The theory of public finance, or public finance, is actually market finance. Public finance includes the following two basic requirements: (1) is a "public" national finance or government finance, and the specific embodiment of public finance is to provide "public * * * * services" for the market; (2) It is a financial type or model.
Another point of view is that the so-called public finance is a budget-related economic behavior that the government provides public services to the market in order to realize its functions. Its main points: First, it is clear that the government (country) is the main body of public finance; Second, it is clear that the content of public finance is an economic behavior related to budget to provide public services for the market; Third, the purpose of public finance is to realize the functions of the government.
The third view is that the so-called public finance refers to the government finance that provides public services or public products to the market or the private sector. It is the basic choice and inevitable requirement of government finance under the condition of market economy, and it is a financial model or type that adapts to market economy. It only exists in the market economy environment.
The so-called public finance, in short, is the government revenue and expenditure activities or financial operation mechanism model for the purpose of meeting public needs. It is a financial type that adapts to the characteristics and development requirements of market economy. This kind of public finance operation mechanism or financial type mainly has the following typical characteristics:
First, the publicity of financial operation objectives. That is, meeting the needs of the public is the main goal or basic starting point of organizing national financial activities. This is the basic orientation of financial operation under the condition of modern market economy, and it is also the basic boundary or guiding principle that national financial activities should follow. Because China's socialist market economy is a competitive society composed of diversified market subjects, economic subjects, or diversified investors, producers, operators and consumers, one of the basic responsibilities of the government, including state finance, is to face the whole society, provide public products and services for it, and provide public basic conditions necessary for social investment and production and operation for different regions, various economic components, diversified market subjects and economic subjects in China. The state should also play its due role, and play an active role in promoting public distribution, promoting social welfare and improving living standards through the adjustment or redistribution of income distribution and the establishment and improvement of social welfare and social security systems.
The second is the publicity of fiscal revenue and expenditure activities. Under the planned economy system, the mode or source of fiscal revenue is mainly based on the profits of state-owned enterprises, which involves a limited social scope, and the vast number of urban and rural residents are almost out of touch with the national fiscal revenue, especially tax revenue. Under the condition of socialist market economy, fiscal revenue mainly comes from various taxes paid by market entities, legal entities and urban and rural residents in social and economic life according to law, which makes the sources of fiscal revenue in China more extensive and open than in the past. Therefore, the country should naturally adhere to the principle of "taking from the people and using it for the people". In connection with this, the arrangement of state financial expenditure mainly focuses on the social public needs or public expenditure such as the operation of state organs, the construction of social public infrastructure, the development needs of national defense and science, education, culture and health, the protection and governance of ecological environment, social welfare and the construction of social security system. Moreover, in a certain stage or period of economic development, the adaptability or level of meeting these public expenditure needs should be regarded as an important boundary for organizing national fiscal revenue and expenditure activities and an important symbol for measuring the appropriateness of fiscal revenue and expenditure scale.
The third is the standardization and legitimacy of financial behavior. Finance is an important embodiment of state functions and the material or financial basis of state power. In essence, financial function is a national function, which is determined by the scope of government functions. Under the condition of modern market economy, the various powers of the government are often stipulated through legislative procedures and clearly stipulated by relevant laws. Therefore, financial actions or activities determined by state functions, especially government affairs, often have the characteristics of legality, standardization and publicity.
In addition, in addition to the above three typical characteristics, public finance should also have the characteristics of making up for market failure and non-market for-profit finance. At present, there are five research achievements about the basic functions of public finance in domestic academic circles: one is the function of supporting economic system innovation; The second is the function of managing state-owned assets; The third is to establish the function of financial investment and financing management system; The fourth is the function of adjusting income distribution; The fifth is the function of stabilizing the economy and promoting economic development.
However, some experts and scholars believe that the original intention of those who advocate "public finance" in China is to let finance withdraw from the field of competitive resources, which is in line with the requirements of the socialist market economy. However, combined with the current reality, some problems are also worth discussing: First, it is right to advocate financial withdrawal from the field of competitive investment, but we cannot but consider the current reality of our country, which is still in the development stage for a long time and faces arduous structural adjustment tasks, and is a country that implements market economy. Secondly, the so-called competition field should also be analyzed in detail. The basic industrial sectors that dominate the lifeline of the national economy, such as steel, coal, chemicals, railways, civil aviation and high technology, are both monopolistic and competitive. In a country with underdeveloped capital market like ours, only by giving full play to the function of financial resources allocation can we accelerate development. Third, large and medium-sized state-owned enterprises in competitive industries in China are the main source of national fiscal revenue. The way out for these enterprises is to implement the shareholding system reform and face the market, but this needs a process. Under the current circumstances, it still needs financial investment or some preferential policies to support it. There are three main views:
One view is that public finance is a kind of financial type or mode that is suitable for market economy. It refers to the government finance under the market economy system, and its essence is market economy finance. In the process of deepening the reform of China's financial system and financial operation mechanism, the issue of public finance is mainly to adapt to the objective needs of establishing and perfecting the socialist market economic system, to adapt to the new situation and new requirements of current and future reform and development, specifically, to adapt to the transformation of resource allocation mode; Second, in order to adapt to the transformation of government functions; Third, in order to adapt to the change of macro-control mode; The fourth is to adapt to the transformation of financial operation mode.
The second view is that if we want to engage in a market economy, we must engage in public finance. Throughout the world, the financial operation mechanism of market economy countries, although different in form and diverse in emphasis, is similar in basic mode. That is to meet the public demand, define the scope of financial functions, and build a government financial revenue and expenditure system. China has moved from a planned economy to a market economy, and the economic system environment has changed. Obviously, the financial operation mechanism should be constructed according to the mode suitable for the market economic system.
The third view holds that with the deepening of economic reform, the establishment of public finance is not only a problem of financial model reform, but also directly causes changes in the behavior of our government, which is a key step to further deepen market-oriented reform in China and will greatly accelerate the process of establishing and perfecting China's market economic system. Otherwise, the establishment of a socialist market economic system will only be empty talk.
At present, China wants to establish the basic framework of public finance, mainly aiming at the disadvantages of excessive expenditure, absence of public finance and offside of state-owned capital finance under the traditional financial management system. Its fundamental purpose is to solve the positioning problem of financial function under the condition of market economy, and it does not deny the distribution behavior that "national distribution theory" thinks that finance is dominated by the state (government). The state has two identities, namely, the executor of political power and the representative of state-owned economy, exercising two functions of social management and economic management, and the unique "one body and two wings" pattern of socialist finance (the national tax department and the state-owned assets management department become the two wings of the financial subject, and both are indispensable). This is the sublation of western public finance theory and the innovation of financial system. Based on this, the implementation of public finance must not ignore the "state-owned capital finance", nor can it copy the western model. To sum up, the domestic academic views on the financial differences between China and the West are as follows:
First, if we do not consider the social differences between the two public finances, only from the perspective of their distribution subjects, they are basically the same, and they are both governments exercising political power. However, under two different social systems, the status and role of state-owned economy in the whole economy are different. China has state-owned finance, while western finance does not. In this way, China's public finance is only a part of the whole finance, while the western public finance is the whole finance. Therefore, the operation of public finance in China must be combined with the operation of state-owned assets finance. According to the principle of separating government from enterprise, the state still has the responsibility of supporting, guiding, supervising, regulating and controlling the establishment, production and operation of state-owned enterprises, maintaining and increasing the value of assets, and obtaining and rationally distributing the use income.
Secondly, as far as the economic relationship reflected by public finance is concerned, because two different modes of production and social systems have different class attributes, public finance with the government as the main body as the social manager reflects different economic attributes. Bourgeois finance classifies politics, political parties and religions into economic categories. In our country, according to the basic principles of Marxism, it is clearly put forward that politics is the concentrated embodiment of economy, and political work is in the position of commander-in-chief and soul of economic work.
Several problems that should be paid attention to in establishing the theoretical system of public finance;
(1) Public finance is a concept corresponding to private finance and an objective requirement for government finance. Public finance is a concept corresponding to private finance (finance), and it is a revenue and expenditure activity that represents public interests and meets public needs. Public interests and needs here refer to those of the general public. The social publicity of public finance purpose is the difference between public finance and private finance. From the behavioral characteristics, public finance is a revenue and expenditure activity, which constitutes the essential difference between public finance and other public behaviors.
Obviously, our definition of public finance here is different from the traditional definition. According to the traditional view, public finance is public economy, that is, the government provides public goods. Because the government's function is mainly to provide public goods, public finance has almost become synonymous with the government, which is obviously inaccurate. Here, we describe public finance as revenue and expenditure activities that represent social public interests and meet social public needs, which emphasizes the behavioral implication of public finance as revenue and expenditure activities, and also highlights the conceptual differences between public finance and the government itself as tools and means to realize public interests and public needs.
The basic premise of the existence of public finance is the existence of social public interest and the carrier of this interest, which is the necessary condition for the existence of public finance, and to some extent shows the necessity of public finance as a means to realize public interest and social public demand. As a revenue and expenditure activity to meet social public demand, public finance is the representative of social public interest in a certain period. Under the condition that both the state and the government exist, the responsibility of the subject should naturally be borne by the state and the government. Therefore, national finance must be public finance.
The social publicity of national finance is first determined by the social responsibilities and functions of the state and the government. The state and the government representing the state are social managers and, of course, representatives of social public interests. It is one of the most important responsibilities of the state and the government to embody and realize public interests. Therefore, national finance must be public finance. Government finance that does not reflect and realize public interests and needs is abnormal and flawed. In this sense, public finance is an objective requirement for government finance.
(B) publicity is the general nature of government finance.
According to the traditional view, public finance is the behavior of the government to provide public goods for the society, and its emergence and existence are caused by the natural defects of the market mechanism, that is, because there are some irreparable defects in the resource allocation of the market mechanism, the government needs to come forward to make up for the market defects by providing public goods. Obviously, this is a necessary condition to regard the market economy as the existence of public finance, that is, public finance is the manifestation of government finance under the market economy system. In this regard, the author has different views. We believe that public finance is not the special nature of government finance under the market economy system, but the general nature of government finance, because no matter what social form of government finance, it is the same starting point and ownership of government finance to embody and realize social public interests and needs, and the difference here is only the level of social public interests and needs determined by the differences in productivity levels.
There may be a question here, that is, whether the government finance in the period of China's traditional planned economy system is heavily involved in private financial affairs has the nature of public finance, and if there are exceptions, how to explain the statement that public finance is the general nature of government finance. The author believes that the government finance in the period of traditional planned economy system in China is still public finance. The main problem here is that under the planned economy system, private personal needs are controlled in the narrowest scope, and a considerable part of personal needs are alienated into public needs or realized in the form of public needs. It is the inconsistency between the individualization of private demand and the realization form of public demand that leads to the inefficiency of the planned economy system in providing private products and meeting personal needs, which just illustrates this point from another side. We can't deny the existence of a mechanism just because it runs abnormally. Similarly, we can't deny the public financial nature of government finance just because it has replaced many private financial functions under the planned economy system.
(3) The significance of public finance lies in the reasonable positioning of government financial functions.
The reason why we should emphasize the public finance nature of government finance is that public finance has made a reasonable position for government finance, defined the scope and main functions of government finance, and made a reasonable division of the scope and division of labor between government and market in modern market economy. Public finance emphasizes that what should be included in the scope of government finance should be matters with public interests and needs. For those private interests and personal needs, the government can only provide external conditions for their normal realization, but can not directly participate in the realization process. Because private interests and personal needs have their own realization mechanisms, individuals' pursuit of their own interests gives them sufficient micro-motivation, so the government does not have to directly intervene in their realization process; At the same time, individual needs reflect different individual preferences, which makes it impossible for the government to directly participate in the realization process; In addition, the realization of individual needs can be carried out between individuals according to the principle of equivalent exchange, which meets the individual needs of buyers for the material form of goods on the one hand and the pursuit of sellers for the realization of commodity value on the other. On the other hand, due to well-known reasons, it is difficult to meet the needs of the public according to the principle of equivalent exchange, and the responsibility for its realization can only be mainly borne by the government. It can be seen that the satisfaction and realization of individual needs of social members do not need and cannot be realized by government finance, while social public needs should be met mainly through government channels. Government finance is essentially a public finance that exists to meet public needs. Public finance defines the scope of government's allocation of resources, that is, the scope of government's direct allocation of resources should be in the field needed by public finance. Its significance lies in the reasonable positioning of government financial functions, emphasizing the social publicity of government finance and conceptually distinguishing government finance from private finance.