What is the biggest problem in China's trade pattern?

With the US subprime mortgage crisis evolving into a global financial crisis, the world economic growth may continue to slow down, and the external environment for China's foreign trade development will further tighten in the next few months. According to the current situation, it is estimated that the total import and export volume of commodities in China will reach 2.6 trillion US dollars in 2008, an increase of about 20%.

First, China's foreign trade problems

(A) China's foreign trade is not market-oriented.

1. The export products of domestic enterprises must be approved by the government, and most production enterprises cannot directly enter the international market to export products.

Although China has continuously reformed the traditional trade system, such as giving some production enterprises the right to operate import and export, only a few large and medium-sized state-owned enterprises (including a few scientific research institutions) have obtained the right to operate import and export, and their right to operate import and export is still restricted for a long time, and their business scope is strictly limited. In fact, the production enterprises that have the right to operate import and export cannot really operate import and export business completely independently. In addition, although China also allows private enterprises to obtain the right to operate independently in import and export, the entry threshold is very high and the number is extremely limited. In short, China's right to operate foreign trade is still controlled by the state. Only a few production enterprises have the right to directly engage in import and export trade activities, and most enterprises do not directly enter the international market to export products. These enterprises that have no right to operate independently can only export their products through state-owned foreign trade companies. This means that for most production enterprises without import and export rights, they cannot directly enter the international market and engage in import and export trade freely, so there are still "barriers" between them and the international market. (Note: In order to solve this problem, the China Municipal Government put forward the reform idea of "combining industry and trade". However, because China's state-owned foreign trade companies and state-owned production enterprises have no independent property rights, the "combination of industry and trade" between China's foreign trade companies and production enterprises is mostly carried out in the form of administrative merger under the planning of the government, rather than in the form of property rights transaction, which not only cannot complement each other, but leads to high internal management and coordination costs. In short, the problem of "barriers" between China's production enterprises and the international market has not really been completely solved. )

Since the right to operate foreign trade is subject to administrative examination and approval by the government, which production enterprises can enter the international market is completely designated by the government. Therefore, in the absence of market competition, screening and elimination mechanism, enterprises that can directly enter the international market to engage in import and export business are not necessarily the most efficient enterprises, which will inevitably lead to the inefficiency of foreign trade. At the same time, because most domestic production enterprises can't directly enter the international market and engage in import and export trade freely, many domestic production enterprises can't completely freely and flexibly produce products that fully meet the needs of the international market in time according to the supply and demand situation of domestic and foreign markets, so as to maximize China's exports, which artificially suppresses China's export supply elasticity.

More importantly, because China's private enterprises (note: "private enterprises" is a special term in China, in fact, enterprises only have different organizational forms because of different property liabilities or civil liabilities (limited liability or unlimited liability), and there is no problem that the nature of enterprises is different because of different owners. ) Without the approval of the government, you are not allowed to engage in import and export trade activities freely. Therefore, this is not conducive to China's continuous emergence of more complete self-financing, and the real internal motivation and pressure of expanding export market players on the basis of comparative advantages, thus greatly hindering the sustained growth of China's per capita export volume. (Note: Although China ranks the seventh largest trading entity in the world, its per capita trade volume or export volume is not high compared with China's huge population. For example, Britain and France have a population of just over 50 million, and the total import and export volume of 1999 ranks fourth and fifth in the world respectively. ) It can be seen that the export restrictions on private enterprises are actually artificial restrictions on China's export expansion ability.

In addition, although China's foreign trade companies monopolize China's import and export under the protection of the government, China's state-owned foreign trade companies are not competitive in the international market because of their small scale. Moreover, because these state-owned foreign trade enterprises do not bear the ultimate property responsibility for operating losses, in order to expand exports, foreign trade enterprises in various countries often raise prices irresponsibly at home and compete at low prices abroad. This disorderly competition of state-owned foreign trade enterprises without internal constraints not only leads to the disorder of export order, but also increases the foreign exchange cost of China's exports and reduces China's trade income.

2. In China, the government has de facto control over imports, and the degree of marketization or liberalization of imports is even lower.

Although China has been reducing tariffs since 1992, China's policy intention of reducing tariffs is actually to ease China's excessive balance of payments surplus and expand the import of capital goods or technical equipment (more than 80% of China's imports are capital goods) in order to improve the productivity of domestic enterprises, rather than to introduce the competitive mechanism in the international market through import liberalization. Moreover, although China has continuously lowered non-tariff barriers, in fact, there are still quantitative restrictions in different names for some imported goods that have been abolished in quota and license management, and some investment projects that need imported goods need prior approval from the government or policy guidance from government departments. At the same time, China has some de facto control over the import procedure (such as requiring the seal approval of several government departments, and the import procedure is too complicated). In addition, while the government strictly controls imports, China still monopolizes the import of many products (such as crude oil, refined oil and agricultural products). ), which is actually a non-tariff barrier.

Although China's import control protects some domestic industries or enterprises (especially state-owned enterprises) to a certain extent, it reduces the competitive pressure of imported products, making it impossible for domestic enterprises to obtain low-cost production inputs, thus reducing the production efficiency of domestic enterprises.

(B) China's foreign trade lacks the internal motivation of economies of scale.

According to the basic viewpoint in the new trade theory, enterprises participate in international trade in order to expand the market sales of products by entering the international market, so that enterprises can produce more products on the basis of expanding market share, thus reducing the average production cost of products, thus helping to reduce the price of products, thus greatly improving the price competitiveness of products in the international market and maximizing profits. However, most enterprises in China have not really achieved economies of scale. Many enterprises export only for export, and export is to earn foreign exchange, not necessarily to minimize costs or create profits. Because the scale of China enterprises (including foreign trade enterprises) is generally small, and the production cost of China enterprises is generally high and the productivity is generally low, the exchange cost of China's export products is naturally high.

(c) China's export structure still has the problems of low technical level and added value.

China's industrial products with strong export competitiveness are mainly traditional labor-intensive products (including textiles, clothing, shoes and hats, toys, consumer goods, etc., which account for a large proportion). These products have short product chains and low added value. At present, nine of the 10 products exported by China are labor-intensive manufacturing products (such as shoes, toys and sporting goods, as well as fabrics and clothing).

At present, although the export of mechanical and electrical products in China is growing rapidly, it mainly depends on processing trade and foreign-invested enterprises. Moreover, China's mechanical and electrical products are generally low-grade, with low technical content and added value, lacking potential pillar products, and the export capacity of pillar industries has not yet formed a scale. At the same time, China's high-tech products (especially those with core technologies and independent intellectual property rights) account for a small proportion of total exports, only 15% (the average of the top ten exporting countries in the world is about 40%), and most of them are realized by foreign-funded enterprises. In addition, China's service trade (including banking, insurance, telecommunications, law, accounting, information industry, etc. ) it is weak in the international market and its ability to earn foreign exchange through export is not strong.

It must also be pointed out that the improvement of China's export commodity structure has largely benefited from the development of processing trade. In processing trade, as long as the processed products are capital-intensive or technology-intensive products, it is statistically reflected in the export of capital-intensive or technology-intensive products, but in fact, a large number of domestic processing procedures are relatively short and the added value is not high. It can be seen that the export growth of capital-intensive or technology-intensive products, mainly processing trade, does not mean that China's export structure has really reached the advanced level.

Second, the property rights in China's foreign trade

According to the viewpoint of property rights economics, the essence of market transaction is property rights transaction. If this viewpoint is introduced into the international trade theory, we can draw a new theoretical viewpoint: the essence of international trade is actually the international transaction of property rights. In this case, this paper analyzes China's foreign trade from the perspective of property rights, so as to carry out theoretical innovation and provide correct development ideas for China's foreign trade.

(A) The root of China's non-marketization of trade is the traditional state-owned property right system.

Since the essence of international trade is actually the international transaction of property rights, the essence of marketization or liberalization of international trade is the free international transaction of property rights. This means that the most fundamental thing for a country to truly liberalize its foreign trade is that its microeconomic entities not only have the right to independently acquire or own property at home and abroad, but also can freely trade property rights at home and abroad. It can be seen that the institutional premise of trade liberalization is decentralized property rights system.

The characteristics of China's current property rights system are: (1) the property rights of most production factors (including land, capital and entrepreneurial talents) are still in the hands of the state, and the property rights of the state are special property rights above all other property rights. (2) state-owned enterprises (including state-owned foreign trade companies) have no independent property (that is, they have no ownership of the net assets of the enterprise). (3) The property rights of private enterprises are not truly universally respected by society and equally protected by law.

In the traditional property right system, because the state (in fact, the government) still holds the property right of most production factors, and the state property right is a special property right above all other property rights, the government is naturally still the most important economic decision-maker or organizer of economic activities. In this case, the right to operate import and export is naturally controlled by the government, which means that it is difficult for microeconomic entities to engage in import and export trade freely under the traditional property rights system.

In fact, when state-owned enterprises (including state-owned foreign trade companies) have no independent property, so they can't really bear the property responsibility of operating losses (including import and export losses) independently, they can't be allowed to have complete independent import and export management rights. Because, if these enterprises, which do not bear import and export losses and therefore have no internal self-restraint mechanism, are allowed to engage in foreign trade completely freely, it may lead to vicious foreign competition regardless of cost, which will not only lead to chaos in China's foreign trade order, but also greatly reduce China's trade income. Obviously, in this case, our government also has to implement the examination and approval system for foreign trade management rights.

In addition, because in the traditional property rights system, the property rights of private enterprises have not been truly universally respected by society and equally protected by law, it is difficult to be regarded as the natural or natural right of private enterprises to engage in import and export trade freely. Only with the approval of the government can private enterprises be granted the right to engage in import and export trade.

(2) The traditional property right system artificially limits the expansion of enterprises in China.

Under the traditional property right system, because the state does not encourage other property owners to invest in state-owned enterprises in order to protect their ownership and control, and because the managers and employees of state-owned enterprises have no ownership of the net assets of enterprises, the managers and employees of state-owned enterprises have no internal motivation to continuously expand the net assets of enterprises, resulting in the lack of internal scale expansion mechanism of state-owned enterprises. At the same time, because state-owned enterprises are not the subject of property rights or market with independent property, they do not enjoy ownership of the property they occupy. Therefore, it is impossible for state-owned enterprises to carry out real mergers and acquisitions that will transfer ownership (ownership will always be in the hands of the state), which makes our state-owned enterprises lack external scale expansion mechanism. In addition, because the property of private enterprises has not been universally respected by society and equally protected by law, private owners also lack confidence in the long-term ownership of their property, so private owners in China have no internal motivation to continuously expand the scale of their enterprises, and so on. In a word, the lack of internal and external scale expansion mechanism of China enterprises fundamentally determines that China lacks the internal motivation of scale economy in foreign trade activities.

(c) The low technical level of China's export products is rooted in institutional constraints.

Because under the traditional state-owned property right system, there can be no real fierce market competition between state-owned enterprises, and because state-owned enterprises have no independent property, they can't really bear the property responsibility for business risks or losses. At the same time, managers and employees of state-owned enterprises do not have ownership of enterprise property formed by adopting advanced technology, and technology cannot be transformed into rewarding investment through the residual claim of enterprises (Yang Xiaokai, 1998), so state-owned enterprises have neither external pressure nor. All these fundamentally determine that state-owned enterprises lack the ability, motivation and pressure of technological innovation, which will naturally lead to the low level of technology exported by us.

In the case of low competitiveness of domestic enterprises, it is difficult for the government to completely liberalize imports.

Because of the traditional property right system, domestic enterprises (especially state-owned enterprises) have low competitiveness, high production cost and poor quality. So in this case, if the import trade is liberalized, domestic enterprises (especially state-owned enterprises) may face the fate of bankruptcy because they cannot compete with foreign enterprises. In this way, the government has to implement a de facto control policy on imports to protect domestic enterprises (especially state-owned enterprises). It can be seen that the essence of import control in China is to protect domestic state-owned enterprises and traditional property rights system.

In short, the above analysis fully proves that the fundamental reason that hinders China from liberalizing its foreign trade and truly becoming a world trade power is the limitations of the traditional property rights system.

Third, property rights reform and the development of China's foreign trade.

According to the above analysis, in order to truly realize the liberalization of China's foreign trade and make China truly become a world trade power, we should carry out system reform, realize the decentralization of property rights, make all microeconomic entities in China truly become owners or property rights subjects with independent property, and stipulate that all owners' property rights are equal.

This system reform, which realizes the decentralization of property rights and stipulates that all owners have equal property rights, will naturally create many market entities or enterprises that really have complete property rights (including the right to freely engage in import and export trade activities and foreign investment activities) and economic decision-making power. (Note: On the basis of property rights reform, the organizational forms of enterprises are no longer divided into state-owned enterprises or private enterprises according to the identity or nature of the owners, but only into sole proprietorships and partnerships according to the different property responsibilities of the owners for enterprise management. All enterprises will compete freely on the basis of complete equality. On this basis, there will be no special problems of "private enterprises". In this way, all enterprises in our country can freely engage in import and export trade activities and invest in the world according to their own wishes or in the way they think fit. (Note: This means that whether China enterprises should become comprehensive trading companies or large enterprise groups integrating R&D, production, investment, trade and finance should be completely decided by enterprises according to the domestic and foreign market conditions, and the government should not artificially design enterprise development models instead of market players. At the same time, because the property right reform will create an institutional environment in which the property of all market subjects is "sacred and inviolable", the government, whose basic duty is to protect people's property rights from infringement, cannot interfere with the economic activities of market subjects at will without legal authorization, otherwise it will infringe the property rights of market subjects. This means that on the basis of property rights reform, the government will no longer be able to directly organize or monopolize economic activities (including import and export trade activities) by using administrative power. Thus, the property right reform with decentralized property rights will naturally realize the marketization or liberalization of China's foreign trade and realize the integrated management of domestic trade and foreign trade (that is, domestic enterprises can engage in domestic trade and foreign trade freely at the same time).

Realizing the liberalization of foreign trade will enable all enterprises in China to engage in import and export trade freely, which means that the "barrier" between domestic production enterprises and the international market will be automatically eliminated, so that all enterprises in China can directly enter the international market, so as to produce products that fully meet the needs of the international market in time and sensitively according to the supply and demand situation of the international market. Moreover, because all enterprises in China are completely self-financing market entities, China enterprises must bear the property liability for export losses completely independently, and at the same time, they can obtain the benefits brought by export profits completely independently. Obviously, this completely self-financing enterprise will truly have an internal self-motivation and self-restraint mechanism, and strive to make the best production and operation or import and export decisions in production and import and export trade activities. Therefore, according to the domestic and international market conditions and their own comparative advantages, we can export the products with the lowest opportunity cost and import the products with the highest opportunity cost, that is, we can export and use the comparative advantages of other countries, so as to minimize costs and maximize profits on a global scale. In order to achieve this goal, China enterprises will really have internal motivation and pressure. They will constantly compare the production cost of products with the prices that consumers are willing to pay or can pay in the international market according to the differences of domestic and international price systems and the fluctuations of international market prices, and try their best to produce the most needed products in the international market at the lowest opportunity cost according to the principle of comparative advantage, thus making our products truly have strong international competitiveness.

It can be seen that trade liberalization based on property rights reform will not only make it difficult to export products that can be profitable in the international market, but also export a large number of unprofitable or loss-making products, and there will be no cost constraints between enterprises engaged in import and export trade activities, leading to chaotic export order and rising export exchange costs. On the contrary, through the market screening, competition and elimination mechanism, only those enterprises with the highest efficiency, lowest cost and truly competitive products can engage in a large number of import and export trade activities, while those enterprises with low efficiency and uncompetitive products will naturally be eliminated by the market, thus fundamentally eliminating the phenomenon of "chaotic export order and rising export exchange costs", thus greatly improving China's export earning capacity and foreign trade efficiency. Moreover, the reform of property rights will continuously create more efficient enterprises to expand their exports according to the international market demand on the basis of self-financing, which will greatly promote the sustained growth of China's per capita exports.

At the same time, under the reasonable property right system, because the first prerequisite for the establishment of an enterprise is to have independent property, this fundamentally lays a market mechanism for the expansion of enterprise scale. Moreover, because the investors of the enterprise have real permanent ownership of the enterprise property, the owners and managers of the enterprise will also have real internal motivation and pressure to continuously expand the net assets of the enterprise in order to obtain more owners' rights and interests, thus improving the profitability and ability to resist business risks of the enterprise, which naturally forms the internal expansion mechanism of the enterprise scale. On the other hand, because China enterprises enjoy the ownership of their net assets, there is a real market merger or acquisition between enterprises to compete for ownership, thus truly forming the external expansion mechanism of enterprise scale. It can be seen that the reform of property rights will really help to make economies of scale a market force to promote the development of China's foreign trade.

In addition, because of the property right reform, all enterprises in our country must really bear the property responsibility for losses themselves, so that all enterprises in our country will have real internal pressure to minimize the production and operation costs to avoid losses. On the other hand, because the property right reform will create many enterprises that compete fairly with each other, China enterprises will naturally have external market pressure to expand their market share by continuously reducing costs to the maximum extent, so as to survive and develop in the fierce market competition. Moreover, on the basis of property rights reform, people have the property ownership formed by technological development, so people will also have real internal motivation to continuously develop and adopt more advanced technologies to accumulate wealth. On this basis, China's technology will naturally continue to progress, so that China's exports of capital and technology-intensive products will naturally continue to grow, which will fundamentally change the problem of low-level technology of China's export products.

Finally, because the property right reform will continuously improve the international competitiveness of China's microeconomic entities, it will lay the foundation for the real import liberalization in China. However, import liberalization will help to directly introduce the fierce international market competition mechanism and break the monopoly. At the same time, it is also helpful to directly introduce the international market price that can reflect the relationship between international supply and demand, and make the international market price signal become the index of domestic resource allocation, thus improving the efficiency of domestic resource allocation.

In a word, only property rights reform can truly liberalize China's foreign trade, maximize China's per capita exports, and truly improve the technical level of China's exports, so as to finally truly make China a world trade and economic power.