The Priority of Exploiting Fiscal Revenue or Lessening Public Expenditure: Evidence from China

Abstract

In the past 28 years, we find that except for the fiscal revenue of 5,132.1 billion yuan in 2007, which is greater than the fiscal expenditure of 4,978.1 billion yuan, presenting a fiscal surplus, the fiscal expenditure of the rest years is greater than the fiscal revenue, showing the situation of public sector net cash requirement (psncr), especially in 2011, the deficit( the gap between fiscal expenditure and fiscal revenue) is 537.3 billion yuan. Since then, the gap between expenditure and revenue has been increasing with each passing year. In 2015, the fiscal deficit is 2,368 billion yuan. In 2018, the fiscal deficit has been expanded to 3,754.4 billion yuan. In order to avoid the continuous increment of the deficit. This paper discusses the causal relationship between China's fiscal revenue and public expenditure from 1990 to 2018. If fiscal revenue has a positive impact on public expenditure, showing that the government shall reduce fiscal deficit through tax increment. On the contrary, it makes public expenditure continue to expand, leading to the continuous deterioration of fiscal deficit, so as to further decide whether China's future fiscal policy should adopt increasing fiscal revenue or deducting public expenditure policy to reduce the deficit.