What are the conflicts of interest between the government and the people?

I think this comrade's analysis is very reasonable.

Theoretically speaking, the government is the people's government and represents the people's interests. The interests of the government should be consistent with the interests of the people, at least their fundamental interests are consistent, and there should be no conflict. However, the reality is often unsatisfactory, and the interests of the government often conflict with the interests of the masses, such as demolition offices and nail households, urban management and self-employed, government officials and petitioners ... and the group incidents caused by this. This has led all sectors of society to widely believe that this is a problem of the government's ruling style, including corrupt phenomena such as bad attitude and black-box operation when dealing with the interests of the masses, but I don't think this is the fundamental reason.

At home during the winter vacation, there are many communities around facing demolition, and I often see urban management cars patrolling, posing a terrible posture. I can't figure out why they visit from time to time, but after asking, I finally understand. It turned out that after the government posted a notice to inform the demolition area, every household secretly expanded their houses at home, hoping that the residential area measured during the demolition would be larger to get more compensation. In fact, before the government informed the demolition, the real estate bureau had taken aerial photos of every house and recorded it. If residents later expand privately, it will be an illegal building and will not be recognized. Therefore, we must stop this unauthorized expansion to defraud compensation. This is the role of urban management, but also forced to face the "unruly" urban management. It is said that some residents' houses expanded privately were rebuilt after being pushed by the urban management, and their perseverance is admirable. In fact, the behavior of the masses is completely rational. Everyone wants to have a bigger living area and get more compensation, and urban management also acts according to law. No one is wrong. So the problem still lies in the difference of decision-making behavior between the government and the masses.

Government decision-making pursues the maximization of social interests, which is consistent with the interests of the masses. However, the goal of maximizing social interests may also conflict with the interests of the masses. The following is divided into two aspects. First, if a policy can increase the welfare of some people without reducing the welfare of anyone, it is a good policy, which is called Pareto improvement in economics. But in reality, Pareto improvement does not exist, because people "do not suffer from widowhood but suffer from inequality." As long as someone increases the welfare, others will be dissatisfied, and at this time the welfare has been reduced. The government usually thinks that as long as the advantages of a policy outweigh the disadvantages, the policy can be implemented because the total social welfare is rising. For example, the policy of raising the minimum wage, if the government introduces the policy of raising the minimum wage by 100 yuan, then on the one hand, the income of most employees (for example, 2,000 people) in society will increase by 100 yuan, on the other hand, enterprises will lay off some employees (for example, 200 people) because of increased costs, resulting in unemployment. And 2000 employees will benefit, only 200 employees will suffer, and the total social welfare will rise. However, this is not the case! Because for most employees in the whole society, the policy only brings them a price difference of more than 100 yuan or less 100 yuan, which has little impact on living standards; For the unemployed minority, there is a difference between income and no income, which is related to survival and eating. I don't need to say more about which is more important. On the one hand, the government is publicizing how much benefits the policy has brought to the people, on the other hand, some workers are suffering from unemployment, so the social interests pursued by the government naturally conflict with the self-interests pursued by the masses.

Second, the government's decision-making focuses on long-term interests, that is, lasting economic development, such as economic structure, industrial layout, urban planning and so on. And the decision-making of the masses focuses on their own short-term interests, that is, the stability of life, such as employment, income, housing, medical care, etc. , will cause the long-term interests pursued by the government and the short-term interests pursued by the masses conflict. For example, for the long-term development of urban economy, the government has introduced policies to eliminate backward production capacity and close high-energy-consuming enterprises. This is a good policy, which is conducive to environmental protection and the long-term development of urban economy, but it conflicts with the short-term interests of the masses. They don't think about low carbon or not, but only care about having money to eat. Because the closure of enterprises has caused their unemployment and their original stable life has been broken, the masses will naturally be dissatisfied. Another example is urban demolition, which is conducive to the long-term planning of the city, the improvement of people's living conditions, and the future generations. But the masses didn't think so much. All he knows is that he is now living in a good government and won't let him live. He wants to rent a house and can't move back until a few years later. Moreover, the old house has lived with feelings for a lifetime and will not go anywhere, thus causing the erosion of the interests of the government to the interests of the masses. Even if you have to move out in the end, you must find a way to secretly expand your house and get more compensation. This is the most rational behavior. As economic subjects, both the government and individuals think from the perspective of "economic man", but different decision-making objectives and starting points will inevitably lead to conflicts of interest.

From this perspective, the government pursues the maximization of the overall interests of society, focusing on the long-term interests of society, while the masses pursue the maximization of their own interests and focus on their own short-term interests. The decision-making behaviors of the government and the masses are different, and conflicts of interest are inevitable. To deal with the relationship between the interests of the government and the interests of the masses, on the one hand, we should reconsider the goal of simply pursuing the maximization of social interests when making government decisions, on the other hand, we should deal with the relationship between the long-term interests of society and the short-term interests of the masses. (Source Liu Lei Blog Column)