Li Xunlei: Seeing The Gap Between The Rich And The Poor From The Increase Of Moutai And Pork

First of all, this is not an academic paper, so you don't have to bother to discuss with me.

Search for two pictures on the Internet. A picture shows that the price of Moutai in 1999 is 53 yuan. The price of Moutai is 168 yuan, but it is reported that some Moutai stores in the market now have a price tag of 1500 yuan.

In this way, it has increased 7.9 times in the past 10 years.

The other picture is the 10 year increase in pork belt bone, 10 yuan a kilogram in 2000, and 26 yuan a kilogram in the last round of inflation in 2008. The reason is that the price of corn has risen sharply, and the rise in corn price is caused by the rise in oil prices.

Today, the price is 21 yuan a kilogram, 10 times increased 1.1 times.

If Moutai is the consumer food of the rich, then with the resolution of the 30 years of food and clothing problems in China's reform and opening up, pork has also been downgraded to the main consumer food for low-income people.

Whether the difference between the two foods suggests the difference in income growth between different income groups? If this judgement is established, the gap between the rich and the poor may have increased 4.24 times in the past 10 years (8.9/2.1).

What is the concept of 4.24 times? Slightly less than the average increase in China's housing price in the past 10 years, and the latter is about 5 times.

Because the poor do not have assets, they rely on wages or farm incomes, so after 10 years, they still have no assets, not to mention assets appreciation. The increase of income is equal to the increase of pork. There are also a large group of people who originally had a bit of money. But they have not made up their minds to buy a house in the past 10 years, but they have been doing stocks. The Shanghai stock index closed at 2073 at the end of 2000, up to 2800 today and 10 or 35% in the next 10 years.

And the rich (or not the rich) bought houses 10 years ago, and house prices rose 5 times, that is, his wealth expanded 5 times.

That is to say, the wealth gap has increased by 4.44 times (6/1.35) over the past 10 years, which is almost equal to the increase in Moutai and pork prices.

This means that if the gap between the rich and the poor reached 5 times in 2000, it would be 22 times today.

Over the past 10 years, the land has become increasingly scarce, because the population is increasing, the rate of urbanization is rising, and the number of farmers entering the city is increasing. Therefore, housing prices are also rising.

It is also precisely because farmers continue to enter the city, so in the past 10 years, the supply of labor is still relatively abundant, and the income growth of migrant workers is not fast enough.

However, since the beginning of this year, migrant workers have shown a shortage. The income growth of low-income groups is significantly higher than that of white-collar workers. The average increase in the minimum income of provinces and municipalities has increased by 20%, of which the minimum wage in Sichuan has risen by more than 30%.

Since the rise in labor costs will drive commodity prices up, the price of pork has also risen a lot since the beginning of this year, because the labor cost accounts for about 15% of the cost of pork in the retail market. In addition, the increase in the overall income level of low-income groups will also lead to a rise in consumer demand. Therefore, we expect that pork prices will rise by about 25% next year, of which pig feed corn prices will rise 10%, and pig grain ratios will increase to 6.8 times the historical average.

The problem is that the rise in the necessities of pork and other living necessities will further increase the cost of living of low-income groups, partly offset the improvement of the quality of life brought about by the rise in pay, especially for those who do not have paid income.

But if we control pork prices through non market means, the interests of pig farmers will be impaired.

Therefore, it is a reasonable choice to subsidize low-income people.

So far, the price of all kinds of resources and agricultural products has not been fully marketed in China. The long-term price distortion has led to many structural contradictions.

The rise of CPI is mainly cost driven. In fact, it can also be seen as a "boost" of luxury goods by ordinary commodities. Further, it is a "boost" of low-income groups relative to the income of high-income groups.

It can be expected that the next year's low wage earners' income will still exceed the high income group, and the wage increase of migrant workers will be higher than that of college graduates.

Correspondingly, the proportion of pay rises in GDP and the decrease in the proportion of corporate profits.

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Therefore, in an image way, only if the price of pork rises more than that of Moutai, can the gap between the rich and the poor be narrowed.

Therefore, the government should do two things well. First, pushing the price reform, not only to further increase the price of agricultural products, but also to promote the marketization of interest rates and increase the property income of depositors; the two is to adjust the structure of fiscal expenditure and reduce the administrative costs of government departments at all levels.

For example, the government and the military departments should not consume expensive liquor when they are banquets, just as the government departments at present should not give the leaders the luxury import cars such as BMW and Mercedes Benz.

After the compression of government expenditure, the extra money will be used to subsidize low-income groups.

According to some scholars' research, from 1978 to 2006, the expenses for administrative management in fiscal expenditure increased by 143 times, and the proportion of total expenditure in fiscal expenditure rose from 4.71% in 1978 to 18.73% in 2006, which is much higher than that in 10% of general countries.

In 2007, China's budget began to adopt a new subject system. Administrative expenses were dispersed in functional categories such as general public services, diplomacy, national defense, public safety, education, science and technology.

If we want to master the administrative costs of the government, we need to separate and summarize the expenses of the government in carrying out the above functions.

Therefore, we assume that 09 years of government administrative expenses still account for 18% of the total expenditure (at least 20%), which is 13722 billion yuan.

If we can reduce the administrative cost of the government by 5.5%, that is, the percentage of administrative expenses in the fiscal expenditure will be reduced by one percentage point, from 18% to 17%, or 75 billion 500 million, which is enough to subsidize the economic pressure brought by the rise of food prices for 100 million people. If the 5% of the urban poor in the urban poor population and 10% of the rural population account for 10% of the total population in the urban area, it is about 30 million and 70 million, respectively.

If every family subsidized 200 yuan a month, the government's fiscal expenditure would only be 72 billion.

If this plan can be carried out, the decline of Moutai will reach at least 20%, while the price of pork will rise by more than 20%. The gap between the rich and the poor will also shrink, and the society will be more harmonious.