Mohe City, Heilongjiang Province, relying on abundant ice and snow resources, stimulates the consumption potential of ice and snow tours by issuing coupons and other forms, attracting many tourists to "punch in". The picture shows tourists playing in a snow park in Mohe City.
Xinhua News Agency reporter Xie Jianfei photo
When it comes to consumption, many people will first think of the scene of residents shopping out of their own pockets. Besides, are there other forms of consumption? Public consumption is the answer.
As one of the two major components of the final consumption of the whole society, public consumption has been frequently mentioned since 2020. From the central government to the local government, a series of targeted policies and measures have been intensively introduced and implemented. The "Fourteenth Five-Year Plan" proposal clearly puts forward that public consumption should be appropriately increased. How to understand public consumption? What can the increase bring? How to grasp "appropriate"?
The scale of public consumption expenditure is increasing year by year.
"It’s almost the end of the year, and there are still a few coupons in the mobile phone that have not been spent, just to buy new year’s goods." Recently, Cui Hao, who lives in Beijing, emptied his online shopping cart.
From online to offline, from large supermarkets to roadside shops, from catering to cultural travel … … Since last year, many governments across the country have funded the issuance of consumer vouchers to local residents. After receiving consumer vouchers, residents can enjoy a certain amount of deduction during the specified period and when the merchants consume. For example, in the second half of last year, Beijing distributed a total of 39 million coupons for food and beverage shopping, smart products and food and beverage takeout; Zhejiang issued 500 million yuan worth of tourist coupons, and selected more than 500 high-quality scenic spots and more than 700 high-quality hotel products; Jilin issued 10.5 million yuan of sports coupons, covering sports education and training, mass ice and snow entertainment and other products and projects.
"It can be reduced from a few yuan to thirty or forty yuan at a time. As long as the consumption meets a certain amount, I will remind consumers to use the coupons when checking out." As one of the participating merchants in Beijing’s coupon issuance activities, Ms. Li, a staff member of Xingdaxuan Supermarket in Haidian District, Beijing, said.
Yi Shaohua, director of the Market Circulation and Consumption Research Office of national academy of economic strategy, said that the COVID-19 epidemic had a great impact on residents’ consumption. In order to boost consumer demand, the state proposed to appropriately increase public consumption. Consumer vouchers introduced in many places are just a form of public consumption, which drives enterprises to participate and residents to consume through government investment.
In addition to issuing coupons, what are the public consumption?
Experts explained that public consumption and residents’ consumption together constitute the final consumption. Compared with residents’ consumption, a major feature of public consumption is that the government or non-profit organizations serving residents contribute to the purchase of public products or services.
In recent years, the scale of public consumption expenditure in China has increased year by year, and now it accounts for about 30% of the final consumption expenditure. From the scope, public consumption involves environmental protection, education, medical care, pension, child care, sports and other fields.
"In March 2020, we launched ‘ A mother’s love-free home ’ Special projects, pay attention to the needs of enterprise employees, especially female employees of childbearing age, and solve the problem of infant care ‘ It is difficult and expensive to start a nursery ’ The problem is to introduce professional nursery enterprises and build a nursery service system with government guidance and multi-participation, covering nearly 10,000 employees. " The relevant person in charge of the Jinan area of Shandong Pilot Free Trade Zone introduced that at present, five government-funded nursery service places have been established in Jinan area and the whole city.
As a resident enterprise, Zheng Shaowen, chairman of Huimei Hezheng Education Group, said: "In order to reduce costs, most of the nursery institutions in Jinan are located in the community, and one teacher takes two or three infants and pays attention to the three-in-one education, conservation and nursing. Under the inclusive policy, the relevant expenses of childcare services have fully considered the local wage level and have generally decreased. "
Stimulate household consumption and economic growth
What is the effect of increasing public consumption?
According to data released by the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Commerce recently, Beijing started the consumption season on June 6, 2020, and issued consumer vouchers through financial subsidies, achieving sales of 13.52 billion yuan, stimulating consumption by about 15 times. At the same time, BAIC Group, Suning and other enterprises will be driven to independently issue full reduction coupons and discount coupons totaling about 10 billion yuan.
"I am one of the participating merchants, and issuing coupons is good for both enterprises and consumers. The public’s enthusiasm for consumption is high, and our business is better. Now the daily passenger flow in the store is one-third more than that in the first half of 2020. " Wang Mingsheng, who runs a restaurant in Beijing, said.
From September 11th, 2020 to December 22nd, 2020, not only Beijing, but also Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, issued government coupons for six times, using a total of 380 million yuan of government subsidy funds, achieving sales of 6.74 billion yuan, boosting consumption by over 17 times. Three days before Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province issued consumer vouchers, 30 million yuan of subsidy funds boosted 450 million yuan of consumption.
"Appropriately increasing public consumption can reduce the economic burden of consumers and enhance the consumption power of residents, which is manifested in expanding purchasing power and improving consumption quality." Yi Shaohua said that if public consumption investment is insufficient, public services such as health and old-age care are relatively weak, and residents have worries, their willingness to consume will be reduced, and the basic role of consumption will be inhibited. In this sense, as an important part of final consumption, the increase of public consumption can not only directly promote consumption growth, but also be an important engine and reliable guarantee for stimulating residents’ consumption growth. According to estimates by relevant institutions and scholars, public consumption will increase by 1 percentage point, which is expected to directly and indirectly boost economic growth by more than 0.2 percentage point.
In addition to stimulating consumption and promoting economic growth, increasing public consumption also plays an important role in promoting social development and improving people’s livelihood. Liang Ma, a researcher at the National Institute of Development and Strategy of Renmin University of China, believes that by increasing public spending on education, medical care and sports facilities, we can not only strengthen the ability to prevent and respond to infectious diseases, but also improve the quality and efficiency of public service supply.
Zheng Shaowen said that due to the relatively low cost and good service, nursery institutions are now recognized by more and more parents in Jinan City, Shandong Province. "Nursery provides a place for young parents to care for and cultivate their children, provides a certain guarantee for female employees to take up their posts, and also solves the problem of family conflicts between generations and improves family harmony."
Do what you can to improve the efficiency of expenditure
In the future, how will public consumption exert its strength? Experts pointed out that the key point is the "appropriate increase" proposed in the 14 th Five-Year Plan. These four words can be viewed in two aspects.
The first is "increase". Long Shaobo, a researcher at China Institute of Economic Thought and Practice in Tsinghua University, and other scholars believe that it is both realistic and necessary to increase public consumption. On the one hand, increasing public consumption can significantly promote consumption growth and economic and social development; On the other hand, China’s public consumption rate (the proportion of public consumption in GDP) has the potential to improve. In 2018, the global average public consumption rate was 16.9%, the euro zone public consumption rate was 20.6%, and the OECD countries’ average public consumption rate was 17.7%. In comparison, China’s public consumption rate was lower than the global average and even lower than that of major economic regions.
The second is "appropriate". Yi Shaohua pointed out that the source of funds for public consumption is fiscal revenue. However, due to the epidemic, finance is under certain pressure from the central government to the local government. Therefore, public consumption expenditure should take into account the financial affordability and sustainability and do what it can. In addition, as part of final consumption, public consumption and household consumption have a reverse crowding-out relationship in specific areas. Excessive public consumption may affect the growth of household consumption, which is obviously not conducive to stimulating overall consumption.
"Appropriately increase public consumption, focusing on precise policies, avoiding flooding and improving expenditure efficiency." Yi Shaohua said that at present, the government needs to identify the areas of expanding expenditure, accurately connect the bottlenecks and shortcomings in the consumption field, give play to the basic role of public consumption, provide residents with more high-quality public products and services, solve the contradiction between supply and demand, meet the needs of the masses, and fully release the consumption vitality of residents. Specifically, we should continue to increase public consumption that is shared by society and brings benefits to the public, such as medical care, education, social security, housing, employment, old-age care, child care, etc., and focus on the basic needs that some people cannot meet through private consumption due to lack of financial resources.
Family pension is expected to receive more financial support. "Next, we will focus on promoting ‘ A mother’s love-free home ’ Special projects will strive to achieve full coverage of inclusive care institutions in Jinan area to meet the needs of enterprises, employees and people’s livelihood. " The relevant person in charge of the Jinan area of Shandong Pilot Free Trade Zone said.
Focusing on new consumer demand, the scope of public consumption is expected to expand. The China Consumers Association said that the smart express box service has the property of community public service, and the field and scope of public service should be appropriately extended or expanded, and the original delivery box in the community should be intelligently upgraded and included in the category of public consumption.
"To appropriately increase public consumption, it is necessary to improve infrastructure construction, at the same time raise the level of rural consumption and promote the equalization of basic public services in urban and rural areas." Yi Shaohua said that it is also necessary to increase public consumption investment in technological innovation and application, pay attention to product technological innovation and upgrading in traditional consumption areas, enhance independent research and development capabilities, and meet the needs of residents’ consumption upgrading.