| Japan is a country of government-led market economy, compared with otherdeveloped es, although the Japanese fiscal expenditure scale is small, but the degreeof intervention in the economy is relatively large. The Japanese government expectsto guide the industry, stimulate private demand and promote economic growththrough fiscal expenditure policies. Japan’s fiscal expenditure policy in differentperiods had varying results, but also caused heavy financial burden and other adverseconsequences. With economic development, China’s fiscal expenditure scale is alsoexpanding, since the reform and opening it has increased by nearly80times. Chinais now in a period of rapid development and economic transformation, the role ofgovernment in the socialist market economy requires constant adjustment, the scaleand structure of fiscal expenditure need to adapt to economic development.Analyzing the impact of the scale and structure of fiscal expenditure on economicgrowth in Japan deeply, summing up the experience and lessons of Japan’s fiscalexpenditure policy, has an important role in guiding the formulation andimplementation of China’s fiscal expenditure policy.This article reviews fiscal expenditure theory of the major theoretical schools ofeconomics and macroeconomic theory of fiscal expenditure affecting economicgrowth, and founds that economists at different times for different views of the roleof fiscal expenditure, the theoretical proposition is compatible with the problemsappeara in different stages of economic development. Classical school of economicsadvocated government should not use fiscal policy to excessive intervention ineconomic development, but should allow the economy to maintain a laissez-faire;1930s’ Great Depression made people realize the importance of government intervention in the economy, Keynesians and its successors believed that governmentcan have a beneficial impact on the economy by expanding fiscal expenditure, andadvocated the need for government intervention in the economy development withpositive fiscal policies to promote economic growth;1970s, due to the stagflationproblem, people began to rethink the role of fiscal expenditure to regulate theeconomy, many schools of neo-liberal economics were against Keynesian stateintervention, thought automatic adjustment mechanism of the market can effectivelyuse resources, believed the government’s macro-control policies can play a role ineffective supervision and constraints to the free market and economy, in theeconomic operation, both the market and the government has its own irreplaceablefunction.Japan’s financial system including the budget system, tax system andexpenditure system.Among them, expenditure system has characteristics includingof expenditure scale being relatively small, a high proportion of fiscal productiveexpenditure, a high proportion of local fiscal expenditure, allocation of financialfunds being paid, and so on. Japan’s administrative bodies is divided into threelevers including of central, prefectural and municipal. The latter two levels ofgovernment are often collectively referred as the local government. A clear divisionof responsibilities and rights is between the central government and localgovernments. Local governments bear70%of the total fiscal expenditure. TheJapanese government established a standardized fiscal transfer payment system, toensure the performance of the functions of local government funding needs. CentralGovernment commits the main duties of transfer payments, the current transferpayments are constituted mainly by local transfer tax, local tax and treasurydisbursements delivery.In the period of reconstruction after World War II, after the bursting of thebubble economy, after the East Asian financial crisis, after the2008global economiccrisis, the Japanese government had repeatedly use expansionary fiscal policy tostimulate economic growth. Despite Japan’s fiscal expenditure increased significantly, also failed to completely change the economic downturn after thebursting of the bubble economy, but led to a sharp rise in the budget deficit.It’s need to determine the expenditure impact on economic growth throughempirical analyses. This article using GDP datas, expenditure datas, capitalformation datas during1969-2011released by Japan Cabinet Office website, as wellas payrolls datas during1969-2011released by Japan Statistics Bureau officialwebsite, conducts a regression analysis using the least squares method with SPSSsoftware, to estimate output elasticity of relative scale of fiscal expenditure, outputelasticity of relative scale of fiscal consumer expenditure, output elasticity of relativescale of fiscal productive expenditure. Based on the output elasticities, thencalculates marginal contribution of fiscal expenditure, marginal contribution of fiscalconsumer expenditure, marginal contribution of fiscal productive expenditure. In thesample period, the impact of fiscal expenditure on aggregate output is not significant,the impact of fiscal consumer expenditure on aggregate output is positive, the impactof fiscal productive expenditure on aggregate output is negative,and marginalcontribution of absolute and relative scale of fiscal expenditure, marginalcontribution of absolute scale of fiscal consumer expenditure, marginal contributionof absolute and relative scale of fiscal productive expenditure to the total output arenegative,only marginal product of relative scale of fiscal consumer expenditure ispositive. Since2006, the marginal product of actual fiscal consumer expenditure hasbeen greater than that of actual fiscal productive expenditure.Through the empirical analyses, we come to a conclusion that during1969-2011,the stimulating effect of Japan’s total fiscal expenditure on economic growth isnegative; In the case of the relative scale of certain expenditure is fixed, Japan’sfiscal consumer expenditure has played a positive role in economic growth, fiscalproductive expenditure has played a negative role in economic growth. So, in thecase of the relative scale of certain expenditure is fixed, the fiscal expenditurestructure should be inclined to consumer expenditure. However, in the long term, inrelation to the scale of Japan’s fiscal expenditure, no matter how to adjust the structure of fiscal expenditure, the impact on economic growth is negative, the fiscalconsumer expenditure and fiscal production expenditure have both exceeded theoptimal scale.Currently, due to the improvement in external demand and stimulus of Abeeconomic, Japan’s economy improved markedly in2013, but if the Japaneseeconomy can continue to grow and achieve full recovery or not, still faces manyuncertainties. Currently, Japanese fiscal sustainability faces enormous challenges.Therefore, the current Japanese fiscal policy is aiming at rebuilding finances. One ofthe specific measures is to enhance the consumption tax, the other is to cut downfiscal expenditure. However, aging leading to increased spending on social security,the government being also by expanding the scale of financial investment tostimulate economic growth and other factors make face difficulties to achieve thefiscal goal. The expansion of fiscal expenditure can not fundamentally solve theproblem.of economic growing continuously and stably. Though through theempirical analyses, it is concluded that Japanis fiscal expenditure scale be large, butat the moment, cutting down fiscal expenditure scale would make economy evenworse. To maintain a proactive fiscal policy in this case, the government perhaps beable to implement tax cuts. So, this paper argues that it is not reasonable that Japanimproving the consumption tax currently in order to solve financial stress.At present, China is in a period of economic transformation and rapiddevelopment, There are some inspirations and lessons of Japanese fiscal expenditure,for China adjusting the scale of expenditure, hedging against financial risks,improving the structure of fiscal expenditure, reforming the fiscal and tax system,and so on. |
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