رشد چین پایدار خواهد ماند؟چشم انداز بهره وری

China’s gradual approach to economic transition has resulted in sustained high growth. However, in recent years Chinese economists have increasingly referred to the growth pattern as “extensive,” generated mainly through the expansion of inputs. Our investigation of the Chinese economy during the reform period finds that reform measures often resulted in one-time level effects on total factor productivity (TFP). China now needs to adjust its reform program toward sustained increases in productivity. Market and ownership reforms, and open door policies have improved the conditions under which Chinese firms operate, but further institutional reforms are required to consolidate China’s move to a full-fledged market economy.

The past three decades have witnessed miraculous achievement in the economic development of China. Since the economic reform process started in 1978, Chinese per capita income has increased eightfold. But the piecemeal and gradual reform strategy pursued by China means that the market still has not permeated the entire economy. Property rights and related institutions are far from the ideal textbook model. However, as in the East Asian NICs, key ingredients of China’s reform strategy have been education, high savings, and export orientation. A controversial aspect of the present strategy is also the attempt to preserve an undervalued currency to promote export.

China has had one wave of reform after another with short-run gains in productivity. Structural reforms with longer-run effects have been delayed in the process. China’s growth strategy since the mid-1990s has emphasized capital formation at the expense of efficient allocation and utilization of production factors, which has led to a slowdown in TFP growth. Ironically China’s recent capital-intensive growth resembles the Soviet Union’s, which China has tried to avoid during its nearly thirty years of economic reform and opening up to the outside world. The Soviet Union only managed GNP growth of 4–5% per year (Perkins, 1988), while China’s GDP has been 8–9% and its economy is much more open. To many international commentators China looks more like the East Asian tigers.11 But in fact both the Soviet Union and the East Asian NICs applied the model of unlimited labor-supply, since both emphasized saving and investment strongly (Sachs, 2004).