Abstract: During the transition period, the economic target management system promotes economic growth through the allocation of financial resources, which is bound to have an important impact on the sustainability of local finance. This paper manually collects and organizes the economic growth target data disclosed in the work reports of provincial and prefecture-level municipal governments from 2003 to 2018, and empirically examines the impact of economic growth targets on local fiscal efficiency and its influence mechanism. It finds that the goal of economic growth and the “top-down” “layer-by-layer increase” have increased the level of fixed asset investment, squeezed the livelihood expenditure, and caused the loss of local fiscal efficiency through the distortion mechanism of fiscal expenditure structure. Fiscal autonomy weakens the fiscal efficiency caused by economic growth goals, while regional competition strengthens the local fiscal efficiency inhibition effect of growth targets. In the future, we should change the mode of economic growth, incorporate public services into the government performance appraisal system, improve the efficiency of financial governance and the quality of public service supply, and promote the coordinated high-quality development of economy and finance.

Key words: Economic Growth Target, Layer by Layer Coding, Distorted Spending Structure, Loss of Fiscal Efficiency

摘要： 转型时期经济目标管理制度通过财政资源配置推动经济增长,势必会对地方财政可持续性产生重要影响。本文手工收集整理2003—2018年省市两级政府工作报告披露的经济增长目标数据,实证考察经济增长目标对地方财政效率的影响及其作用机理。研究发现,经济增长目标和“自上而下”的“层层加码”提高了固定资产投资水平、挤压了民生性支出,通过财政支出结构扭曲机制造成了地方财政效率损失。财政自主权弱化了经济增长目标引致的财政效率损失,而地区间竞争强化了增长目标的地方财政效率抑制效应。未来应当转变经济增长方式,将公共服务纳入政府绩效考核体系,提高财政治理效率和公共服务供给质量,促进经济和财政协同高质量发展。

关键词: 经济增长目标, 层层加码, 支出结构扭曲, 财政效率损失