Comment: Hong Kongs stimulus economic measures are difficult to push to benefit

Source: Ming Pao

Ming Pao Society Review

Hong Kong's fiscal budget will be released tomorrow. Officials have repeatedly emphasized that in the past few years, it has accumulated huge wealth and red in the past few years, and its fiscal reserves have shrunk significantly and need to be open source.The epidemic has plagued the Hong Kong economy for 3 years. The government must support economic employment with expansion fiscal policies. Now the epidemic harm has slowed down. It is also reasonable to stimulate economic measures to stimulate economic measures.The momentum of recovery, but the people's livelihood after the epidemic is still fragile. In the past two years, the rich and the poor have intensified, the cost of living in citizens has risen, and the measures to benefit the people must maintain sufficient strength.At present, the government faced by the government is mainly periodic rather than structural. With the economic recovery, the increase in government revenue, the reduction of anti -epidemic expenditures, the financial situation is expected to improve.Support people's livelihood.

Fiscal policy can be adjusted

Persist in helping people to resist inflation

The people's livelihood trapped in the end of the world is difficult. In the past three years, the fiscal budget has launched many measures to support the economy and protect the people's livelihood. For example, in the early days of the epidemic, the government broke the sky to ensure the employment plan and the allowance of the food. In addition, the government used to the pastFor two years, it also issued 5,000 and 10,000 yuan electronic consumer coupons to adult citizens across Hong Kong.This time is the first fiscal budget of the government in the "post -resistance period". The citizens have their own expectations. Many people want to continue to send money to send consumer coupons. Some people want the property market to withdraw spicy.However, looking at the recent official statement, government expenses will be tightened, and some very good measures in the epidemic period will be greatly reduced even if it is not completely canceled.

In the past three years, the government has spent more than 600 billion yuan in expenses that have been resisting and supporting people's livelihood. At the same time, the income of warehouses has decreased significantly due to the epidemic situation.2022/23 is expected to exceed 100 billion yuan.Chen Maobo, director of the Financial Department, said that the challenge to formulate a budget this year is that Hong Kong has experienced a three -year crown disease epidemic crackdown. In addition, the peripheral economic weak has made the warehouse accumulate "high deficit" in the past few years.The momentum of recovery still needs to be reinforced. On the one hand, the official must fight the economy to benefit people's livelihood, add development momentum to Hong Kong, and make a long -term layout for future development. On the other hand, we must maintain fiscal discipline and maintain the sustainability of public finances.Xu Zhengyu, director of the treasury, said that the fiscal reserve is now about 800 billion yuan, which is equivalent to the government's 12 -month expenses, which can be used for 20 months from 3 years ago."There is a way", balanced development needs, Yunyun.

During the epidemic period, the government needs to launch counter -cyclical measures with expansion fiscal policy to slow down the pressure on the economic downturn to citizens and Baiye.The economic recovery of Hong Kong is still in the early stage, some industries have not reunited, and the peripheral environment is full of variables. Now tightening government expenditure is sharply tightened, which may affect the power of recovery.Chen Maobo said that the fiscal policy will be transitioned to "middle loose" from the expansion state of "quite loose". The specific "loose" level needs to be unveiled tomorrow's budget."Water collection" intensity should be ensured at the same time to ensure that people's livelihood is sufficient.

In the past year, the global economic haze is densely covered, and many countries have high inflation. In Hong Kong, citizens also lamented that they are all expensive and electricity costs.With the current peripheral environment, coupled with the continuous tension of geopolitical situations, and the problem of energy prices and inflation, it is believed that in the next year, it is believed that it will still trouble the citizens.After the epidemic, different departments and different industries have different pace. Generally speaking, the asset market has the first response to the real economy.Often later.Assisting citizens to resist inflation should be one of the new budgets. Even if the official wants to tighten fiscal policy, at this stage, it should not be "swinged" to the people's livelihood.The government should even increase the citizen of the citizen.

Unexplicous recovery after the epidemic

Disposal prevention of the poor and the poor

Looking at the world, the crown disease epidemic has exacerbated the disparity between the rich and the poor, which can be said to be a common phenomenon; unbalanced recovery after the epidemic is more likely to make related issues worse.Before the epidemic, the disparity between the rich and the poor in Hong Kong was very serious. Now the situation is particularly the case. The official needs to be committed to the benefits of the economic recovery. Everyone can be covered with rain and dew. The budget is an important tool for re -distribution of wealth.Simple public housing costs tens of billions of yuan, and can only provide 30,000 temporary units for poor residential households. A large number of grassroots citizens still need to care for help.Official poverty alleviation measures must not only be accurate, but also strong.

Hong Kong's population is old, and medical social welfare expenditures have continued to increase in the long run. Structural deficit may occur in the future, but the government has recorded huge wealth and red in the past two years.Reduce, irrelevant structural factors.With the economic recovery, the government's income improves, and the balance of revenue and expenditure is not unable to recover; although the government's financial reserves have dropped to less than 800 billion yuan, it is still enough to make many big international cities enviable.The real problem of public finance in Hong Kong is the low proportion of income in taxation, direct tax (mainly including salary tax and profit tax), and the proportion of land -related income is too high, and it is easy to fall.Long often misunderstand the reasons for the actual income of the government.The SAR government needs to think about how to reduce revenue from land in the long run, so as not to cause huge amounts of wealth and redness in the economic cycle fluctuations, rather than the excuse for reducing the measures of the people.