关键词：地方财政；财政体制；Fiscal Federalism; Recentralization; Local Public Finance
作者：Mingxing Liu; Zhigang Xu; Ran Tao; Fub
发表时间：2011-01-07
概要：
Tax is the lifeblood of a modern state. Without sufficient revenues, the state cannot finance its basic functions and win popular support. Excessive taxation, however, dissipates regime legitimacy quickly and results in state failure (Cheibub 1998; Levi 1988). Oppressive taxation and peasants‟ uprisings have been common under the Chinese dynastic rule and many empires crumbled as a result of popular rebellions (Bernhardt 1997). In the 1990s, excessive taxation reemerged in China‟s countryside. In addition to formal taxes, local governments charged exorbitant levies and fees on rural households. In some cases, farmers‟ financial burdens reached as high as 20-30 percent of their already low incomes (Chen 2003). Many agricultural regions have developed a vicious cycle: to secure tax collection, local governments recruited more staff members; an enlarged local bureaucracy in turn required more revenues and collections (Chen 2003; Yep 2004). Excessive taxation and farmers‟ burdens have become a major source of grievance in China‟s vast rural areas. Farmers brought their complaints against their local governments to higher levels of the administration, including the central government, the court, and also the pubic media. In many incidences, frustration with these formal and bureaucratic channels pushed desperate farmers into direct confrontation with local authorities (Bernstein and Lu 2000; O‟Brien and Li 2005). The central government, fearful of the damage to its legitimacy, responded with a series of tax reform policies starting in 2000. The first step, known as the “tax-for-fee” reform, converted some legitimate local fees into one unified agricultural tax. The new tax rate was raised but local governments were prohibited from levying new fees. In 2004, the central government took a bolder move and started to phase out the century-old agricultural tax on farmers. In the long sweep of Chinese history, this was a rare, if not unprecedented, instance of rescinding any obligation of the farmers to the state. Ultimately, the central leadership aimed to restore its political legitimacy and to reign in local state‟s excessive extraction of farmers.
