First, China's rural basic education investment status and contradictions
Basic education focuses on long-term effectiveness and cannot be directly transformed into productive forces. Different from vocational education and higher education, it has its own "hematopoietic function" and can develop healthily mainly by "blood transfusion". The investment in rural basic education in China has been in an "anemia" state for a long time. To sum up, this is caused by the low level of China's overall education investment, the serious imbalance of total investment, the obvious difference between urban and rural investment in basic education, and the asymmetry of intergovernmental financial structure and compulsory education.
1. The overall education investment level in China is low.
The proportion of education funds in GNP and its comparison with relevant countries are important reference indicators to reflect a country's attention and investment in education. For a long time, the proportion of education funds in China's national budget to GDP is obviously lower than that of relevant countries in the world. As early as the 1980s, the proportion of education funds in the gross national product of developed countries in the world exceeded 5%, such as 6.8% in the United States (1983), 5.6% in Japan (1983), 7.2% in Canada (1985) and the former Soviet Union. See table 1.
According to the data listed in observation table 1, the overall education investment level in China is quite low. In recent years, although China has made great efforts in education investment, the investment in education is still lower than the world average, even lower than the level of many developing countries in the world that lag behind us: the goal of national fiscal education expenditure accounting for 4% of GDP by the end of the 20th century, which was put forward ten years ago, has not yet been achieved, and even showed a downward trend in some years. According to the statistical announcement of national education funds by the Ministry of Education, the National Bureau of Statistics and the Ministry of Finance in 2003, the proportion of national fiscal education funds to GDP in that year was 3.28%, down 0.04% from the previous year.
Source: According to Statistical Yearbook of China (2003).
2. The use of total investment is seriously unbalanced, focusing on non-compulsory education, which makes the investment in basic education even less.
China's education funds are not only insufficient in total investment, but also unreasonable in internal distribution ratio. For a long time, the focus of national financial investment in education has been tilted towards higher education, and the investment in basic education has been too small. Please refer to Table 2.
Source: China Education Comprehensive Statistical Yearbook (1996), edited by State Education Commission, Higher Education Press, 1998 edition, 2 pages.
Source: Statistical Yearbook of Education Expenditure in China (1997—2002), China Statistics Publishing House.
Source: China Education Comprehensive Statistical Yearbook (1996) edited by the State Education Commission, Higher Education Press, 1998, 12, 186.
As can be seen from Table 2, during the five years from 199 1 to 1995, the per capita state funding for higher education in China is more than 10 times that of middle school students and more than 20 times that of primary school students. Moreover, this phenomenon of unbalanced investment is still expanding. From 1996 to 200 1, the funds for higher education increased by three times, while the funds for secondary education and primary education only increased by about 0.6 times. The proportion of investment in higher education increased from 16.3% to 27.8%, an increase of110.5 percentage points, while the proportion of investment in secondary education and primary education decreased continuously, both by about 6 percentage points. Please refer to Table 3.
3. The investment in basic education is obviously different between urban and rural areas.
China's total investment in education is insufficient, and the distribution and use of education investment are unbalanced, which has been very unfavorable to the development of rural basic education. What is even more cruel is that the general allocation of basic education is very small. The difference between urban and rural areas is obvious, and the proportion of urban primary and secondary schools is much higher than that of rural schools, which makes the financial difficulties of rural basic education worse. Please refer to Table 4.
As can be seen from Table 4, the per capita education expenditure of urban primary school students is three times that of rural primary school students, and the per capita education expenditure of rural primary school students only accounts for 76.07% of the national average. This gap between urban and rural basic education investment distribution has always existed. For example, by 2002, the per capita education expenditure of rural primary school students had increased to 708 yuan, double that of 1996. However, it is only 87. 12% of the national average level of primary schools, and there is also such a gap between urban and rural junior high schools. 1996, the average budget expenditure of rural junior high school students' education funds was 435 yuan, equivalent to 79.27% of the national average of junior high schools. In 2002, the per capita education expenditure of rural junior middle school students increased to 796 yuan, but it was only 82.86% of the national average. These comparisons show that the government's investment in public funds in rural primary and secondary schools is obviously lower than that in urban primary and secondary schools.
As can be seen from the above situation, China's education investment has mushroomed. Stripping off higher education first, and then stripping off urban primary and secondary education. Speaking of rural basic education, I'm a little worried.
4. The asymmetry between government financial resources and the rights and responsibilities of compulsory education intensifies the contradiction of rural basic education funds.
As early as May 1985, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China's Decision on the Reform of Education System pointed out: "The responsibility and power for the development of basic education are handed over to the local authorities" and "the principle of local responsibility and hierarchical management is implemented". Originally, this principle was implemented to fully mobilize the enthusiasm of local schools and accelerate the development of rural education, but the result of "hierarchical management" was that the important task of rural basic education was completely delegated to towns and villages. In terms of capital investment, the central and provincial governments have basically stopped investing in rural basic education, relying entirely on township-level finance. 1994 China has implemented a tax-sharing financial system, and the available financial resources at the county and township levels have been greatly reduced, especially at the township level, and the investment in education is very difficult. In order to reverse this unfavorable situation, the State Council issued the "Decision on the Reform and Development of Basic Education" on May 29th, 20001,and put forward the requirement that "the county-level people's government should take the main responsibility for the local rural compulsory education".
However, the responsibility and management authority of rural compulsory education cannot fundamentally solve the problem of education investment, because the difficult situation of county economy is not much better than that of villages and towns. According to the statistics of relevant departments, deficit ratio, a county-level unit in China, was 22% from 65438 to 0998, and it has risen to nearly 60% in 2002. The county-level financial situation is so poor, but it has to bear the heavy responsibility of investing in rural basic education; The central and provincial governments have mastered the main financial resources of the country, but basically got rid of the responsibility of compulsory education funds. This asymmetry between financial resources and compulsory education responsibilities among governments is an important institutional reason for the shortage of funds for rural basic education.
Second, thinking about the investment in rural basic education.
The contradiction of investment in rural basic education in China is so prominent, how to change this situation?
1. Increase the proportion of national financial investment in education as a whole, and redefine the rights and responsibilities of political ships at all levels in rural basic education investment.
It has been pointed out that the overall investment in education in China is insufficient, and the intergovernmental financial structure is asymmetric with the rights and responsibilities of compulsory education. This is the institutional reason for the lagging development of rural basic education in China, which must be changed.
(1) Increase the overall investment of national finance in education. Financial departments at all levels should ensure the steady growth of existing education expenditure, and arrange education expenditure according to the standard of "three growth", that is, the growth of education appropriation of central and local governments is higher than the growth of recurrent fiscal revenue; Per capita education funds should be gradually increased; Teachers' salaries and public funds should be gradually increased. The surplus of local finance should also be used more for education investment.
(2) Strengthen the responsibility and investment of the central and provincial governments to support rural basic education, change the unreasonable situation of attaching importance to higher education and neglecting basic education, and reduce the financial burden at the county and township levels.
(3) The central government directly undertakes the salaries of primary and secondary school teachers, and earnestly implements the system of "special account of salary fund" for primary and secondary school teachers. According to the approved establishment and national wage standard, the financial department will directly transfer it to the teacher's personal account opened in the bank by the central government through the bank. Units or individuals who misappropriate teachers' salaries without authorization should be hell to pay. Only in this way can the stability of rural primary and secondary school teachers be guaranteed most effectively, and all the allocated education funds can be used for rural compulsory education.
(4) Increase the support for basic education in poor areas. Because of the lack of obvious, rapid and direct benefits from investing in basic education, both local governments and farmers in poor areas lack the enthusiasm to invest in basic education, and the central government should implement a policy of preferential investment in education in these areas.
2. Multi-channel education financing
China has the tradition of "walking on two legs". Proceeding from China's national conditions, while adhering to the national financial allocation, we should actively raise education funds through multiple channels to better strengthen the investment in rural basic education.
(1) Governments at all levels collect various education taxes and fees, social fund-raising and various education funds according to law.
(2) Make full use of finance, finance and other means to improve the financing capacity of rural education, including: using national debt funds to purchase rural education facilities; Strive for more low-interest and interest-free loans from international financial organizations and foreign governments and people.
(3) Using various preferential policies to encourage enterprises, social organizations and individuals to donate to rural education.
(4) Introduce preferential policies to encourage rural primary and secondary schools to carry out work-study programs.
3. Establish and improve the operation and management mechanism of basic education investment.
In order to ensure the rational and effective use of basic education investment, we should establish and improve the operation and management mechanism of basic education investment and strengthen the effective use of basic education investment.
(1) Establish a supervision mechanism. The State Council and the people's congresses at or above the county level or their standing committees should strengthen the supervision of education budget expenditure, and at the same time, they also need administrative supervision of supervision departments, audit supervision of audit departments, inspection supervision of education supervision departments and public opinion supervision of news departments, mainly to supervise whether these departments raise funds according to policy allocations, whether education funds are in place in time and whether the use of education funds is reasonable.
(2) Improve the system of unifying the administrative power and financial power of basic education. For a long time, the education administrative departments of governments at all levels have been in charge of education, but the investment in education funds is the responsibility of the government's finance department and planning department respectively. The education administrative department has no right to propose and approve the education budget according to the needs of local education development, which is not conducive to the overall arrangement, scientific management and effective utilization of financial education funds. Therefore, the existing education fund management system should be reformed, and the education administrative department should gradually put forward budget suggestions and incorporate them into the government budget plan. After deliberation and approval by the National People's Congress, all of them will be allocated by the financial department to the education administrative department for overall management. In this way, education funds occupy a stable share in the budgets of the state and governments at all levels, and will not fluctuate frequently due to political, economic or other factors, and a separate budget will be implemented to ensure earmarking.
(3) Strengthen the management of education funds and improve the efficiency of the use of compulsory education funds. There are many difficulties in rural basic education. Although it is related to insufficient investment, we should also see that there are many loopholes in the management of compulsory education funds for a long time, and the phenomenon of leading cadres misappropriating or even embezzling education funds is widespread, which makes the already insufficient education funds worse. Therefore, laws and regulations must be established to punish corruption, improve the quality of education administrators and school administrators, and effectively control and use education funds.
In short, it is impossible to achieve the goal of cross-century basic education development without corresponding education investment. To this end, we must do a good job in the input of basic education and make unremitting efforts to promote the rapid and healthy development of basic education in China.