Science and Technology Daily Li Junxia comprehensive report
On April 22, Yuan Li, director of the Xicheng District Commercial Bureau in Beijing, said that 150 million yuan will be invested in Xicheng District of Beijing to boost consumption. Many netizens exclaimed: Beijing consumer coupons are coming!
In fact, recently, in order to cope with the impact of the new coronary pneumonia epidemic and stimulate consumer recovery, more than 30 cities have issued billions of consumer coupons to citizens.
When everyone is ready to take the consumer coupons for AIDS consumption, the editor also takes this opportunity to give you the science knowledge behind this popular science: what are the consumer coupons? Why issue consumer vouchers instead of sending money directly? How effective is the issuance of consumer coupons? Will it bring up prices?
What is the coupon?
Consumer vouchers, as the name suggests, are vouchers that people use to buy things, and are one of the tools for realizing economic policies. When the economic downturn led to a significant decline in private consumption capacity, the government or enterprises issued consumer vouchers as a payment voucher for the future consumption of the people. It is expected to revitalize consumer activities by increasing the purchasing power and consumer desire of the people, and even further drive The growth of activities such as production and investment accelerates economic recovery.
In special periods such as the financial crisis, consumer coupons have gradually become one of the important means to promote sales and maintain growth. Although the consumption voucher is for the purpose of promoting consumption, it can also be used as a social relief tool.
In fact, as early as 10 years ago, consumer coupons appeared in China. In 2007, a world economic crisis broke out. This crisis lasted for two or three years, and the economies of all countries in the world were sluggish. At that time, many people lost confidence in the economy, and their desire to consume was greatly reduced.
In order to change this situation, China's Dongguan, Zhejiang, Hangzhou, Jiangxi and other places have issued consumer vouchers, including shopping vouchers, travel vouchers, and even education vouchers. At that time, the consumption vouchers were basically paper, and now they have become electronic vouchers.
Why not send money directly?
During the epidemic, many countries have adopted direct gold discovery to ease economic pressure.
The United States recently launched an emergency rescue plan due to the epidemic, distributing US $ 1,200 per person to low- and middle-income people. Canada has announced a rescue plan of 107 billion Canadian dollars, which will distribute 2,000 Canadian dollars per month to the unemployed, which is equivalent to more than 10,000 yuan. The UK directly subsidizes 80% of their wages to those who cannot be worked due to the epidemic.
Some people will say that gold is not more real? Since it is to stimulate everyone's consumption, why can't our country learn from other countries to directly send money, but need to issue consumption vouchers?
In fact, this is mainly related to the consumption patterns of various countries.
A survey conducted by the Federal Reserve in the past found that 40% of households in the United States cannot afford emergency expenses of $ 400. Therefore, in the American concept, borrowing money is a normal state.
The Chinese are much more stable than Americans. The saving rate of the Chinese people was 50% 10 years ago, and now it is 45%. It still maintains the highest level in the world.
If he sends money to the American people, then he turns around and goes shopping in the supermarket. But if you send money to the Chinese, the Chinese may save the money in the bank, and it will not promote consumption well.
So the same is "spreading money", the United States is sprinkling real gold and silver, while China is sprinkling consumer coupons.
In fact, the essence of consumer coupons is tax reduction. The state uses its own financial revenue as an endorsement to distribute cash to citizens.
However, in order to ensure that this cash is not stored, but used for consumption, so some restrictions have been made. For example, set a period of use for you, or how much money will be reduced.
Moreover, consumer vouchers are subsidized by competition. Those who get the vouchers can choose to eat or shop, which means that merchants will compete for this subsidy.
In this way, through the vigorous competition in the market, people's money and consumption coupons will flow to those merchants that are more competitive and more efficient.
Therefore, consumer vouchers must be highly liquid, can replace cash to a large extent, and are financially endorsed consumer vouchers, not their own coupons.
The issuance of consumption vouchers is not only to stimulate consumption, but also to promote the healthy development of the entire economy.
In other words, consumer demand is the final demand. Only when the final demand is strong can the economy really start. Moreover, compared with investment, the role of consumption in stimulating the economy is more direct and rapid, and it can unblock the production cycle in a short time.
How effective are the coupons?
When consumer coupons were issued during the 2008 financial crisis, the company ’s zero-growth rate dropped sharply from 23.3% to 11.6%. After Hangzhou began to distribute consumer coupons in large quantities, it rebounded significantly in the second month and its growth rate exceeded the national level .
And back to the present, as of March 29, the first batch of consumer vouchers in Hangzhou has driven 453 million yuan of consumption. It can be seen that consumer vouchers do have a short-term obvious stimulus effect on the local area.
Will it cause prices to rise?
Then some people may ask, wouldn't the issuance of consumer coupons lead to higher prices? In fact, this question is too much.
First of all, from the perspective of the type of consumption vouchers, this time the main issuance of cultural travel and catering consumption vouchers, mainly service industries, and this type of consumption elasticity is relatively large.
Secondly, the issuance of consumer coupons is only a short-term transitional policy, in order to accelerate consumption in a short period of time, and provide a buffer for the implementation of subsequent mid- and long-term policies. Therefore, long-term consumption coupons will not cause excessive stimulation.
Finally, the editor wants to do a small survey. Do you want the government to issue vouchers or directly send money?
Source: Science and Technology Daily Comprehensive Self-Watching Finance and Economics, Baidu Encyclopedia, China Daily, Beijing News, etc.