國企改革無時間表
KEITH BRADSHER 報道 2012年11月10日
北京——有錢的中國人最多會同時使用三部智能手機，每一部簽約一個不同的國有移動服務提供商，這樣至少總有一部手機有足夠的網絡信號提供可靠的電子郵件服務。多數的中國工廠都配有高污染的柴油發電機以應對每周最多三天的斷電，因為國有發電廠增加的發電能力遠趕不上需求的增加。
同時，在過去幾年為了避開國有銀行的超低存款利率，中國投資者們在監管疏鬆的信託基金上投入了超過1萬億美元（約合人民幣6.24萬億元）。這些銀行要維持豐厚的利潤空間，來彌補向有政治背景的借款人發放貸款造成的損失，所以它們拿不出錢來提高利率。
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儘管近年來人們時常談論中國如何充分地接受了資本主義，但中國經濟的許多重大部門其實並沒有實行資本主義。它們是那些仍然被14.5萬家國有企業壟斷着的行業部門。
中國的高官們正在北京參加共產黨的第十八次全國代表大會，以批准中國的下一屆領導班子。擺在他們面前最棘手的問題之一，就是如何改革這個龐大的國企大帝國。
如今，在談到國有企業時，幾乎沒人會說它們的好話，甚至包括那些經營國有企業的人。國有資產監督管理委員會主任王勇在10月24日向中國立法機關做報告時公開批評了國有企業。
王勇說："將繼續完善電力、電信、石油石化等特殊行業的改革措施，根據產業發展實際進一步放寬市場准入。"但這些所謂的努力是否到頭來只是裝裝樣子，要取決於下一屆領導班子是否願意拂逆那些政治背景深廣的、往往把持着國有企業的大家族。鑒於這些企業極容易滋生內部腐敗和自我交易，因此改革是否能推進，尚無答案。
本周四，即將離任的胡錦濤在黨代會的開幕式上似乎說要為國有企業設限，為參與競爭的私有企業提供平等的機會。但繼任領導團隊的兩位政治顧問仍抱有懷疑，他們認為多數的國有企業仍舊可以有恃無恐。這兩位顧問十分了解共產黨內的派系鬥爭。
他們說，不論是中央、省級還是地方政府，在經濟上都依賴於這些企業的利潤，不會願意割棄。同時，這些國企也為黨內派系和底層幹部提供了政治支持，這些人的忠心支持對政府極其關鍵。
國有企業同樣也是重要的藍領就業崗位的創造者，並經營着為在職及退休員工及其家屬服務的8000多所學校、醫院和社區中心。
根據官方數字統計，國有資本過半或更多的企業佔中國總體經濟活動的35%。但去年他們的利潤佔了總經濟利潤的43%。他們對一長串戰略行業的壟斷使得他們可以對產品和服務要價相對較高，但同時又能從國有銀行以人為壓低的利率得到貸款。
的確，變革的壓力在不斷累積。十八大之前發生的派系鬥爭在國內開啟了一場有關國有企業的大討論。很多經濟學家都說，進一步放開仍由國有資本壟斷的經濟對於今後長期的增長十分關鍵。
前國際貨幣基金組織(International Monetary Fund)及高盛集團(Goldman Sachs)經濟學家、北京私募股權公司春華資本(Primavera Capital)創始人、董事長鬍祖六(Fred Hu)指出，"如無根本性變革，這個國家的經濟前景將逐漸暗淡，步入發達經濟體行列的機會將減少。只有大膽改革才能完全釋放這個國家的潛能和創業能量，推動中國進入第一世界國家的行列。"
因為該話題在中國比較敏感，兩位政治顧問均要求匿名。其中一位表示，民眾支持經濟改革，因此下屆領導班子不可能不聞不問。但新一屆領導者的行動可能僅限於對某些國企進行私有化改革，比如鋼廠，這些沒有壟斷市場、經常面臨產能過剩、激烈競爭以及巨大虧損的領域的企業。
一些汽車行業高管也已經開始呼籲對該領域的投資進行限制。汽車產業也面臨嚴重的產能過剩問題。今年，政府對國企進行了大量更為詳細的審計工作，尋找欺詐或腐敗的跡象。
但這位政治顧問表示，在未來幾年，從通訊、銀行、醫療保健到電力分配等服務領域中更廣範圍的國企有可能會基本"保持不變"。
"很難進行改革，"哈佛大學(Harvard University)教授、國外知名當代中國專家羅德里克·麥克法考爾(Roderick MacFarquhar)同意這一觀點。"長期以來，他們都保持低調，除此之外，他們不知道該怎麼做。"
新的領導班子與上一屆一樣，都與國企有着千絲萬縷的關係。有望成為下一任總理的李克強，其弟是國家煙草專賣局四名副局長之一。華盛頓布魯金斯學會(Brookings Institution)在10月底發佈的報告顯示，這家國有煙草管理機構佔據中國煙草市場98%的份額，產生的利稅在中央政府財政總收入佔7%至10%。
中國的反吸煙運動日益壯大，但卻沒得到政府的支持。布魯金斯學會報告稱，"要想調整政策，首先需要領導層改變思想，特別是要改變把煙草看作'搖錢樹'、驅動中國經濟發展的主要因素這種高度誤導、片面的觀念。"
煙草專賣局拒絕置評，也拒絕讓李克強的弟弟李克明接受採訪。
在對深遠改革普遍的悲觀情緒中，仍有很多相關討論——如果新的領導班子決定解決其中涉及到的棘手的政治問題，他們可能通過哪些方式對國企進行改革。
在過去幾個月里，中國領導層內部提出的最有影響力的提案來自國務院發展研究中心副主任陳清泰。他在論文中呼籲政府從本質上成為國企的投資者，而不是積极參与管理，為每個企業任命管理隊伍。
陳清泰在論文中表示，雖然政府在過去推進三峽大壩等大型項目時發揮了作用，但政府現在應該採取更積極的措施，轉讓在一些領域的所有權，比如面臨產能過剩問題的鋼鐵行業，重新部署，將那部分資金投入新興產業。他呼籲政府聘請更為專業的金融管理者負責改革過程。
周四，胡錦濤似乎表達了對這一觀點的認同，他稱："我們應該深入推進政企分開、政資分開、政事分開、政社分開。"
但還沒有跡象表明各方已經達成共識。
"我覺得政府內部肯定有不同的思想派系，"一名公司經理說，"他們最終的選擇還將取決於新領導班子的勇氣。"這位經理的公司密切關注着一旦國企私有化後收購其股份的問題。
翻譯：曹莉
State Firms, and Their Monopolies, Pose Test for China's New Leaders
November 10, 2012
BEIJING — Wealthy Chinese carry up to three smart phones, one for each of the three state-owned mobile phone service providers, in the hope that at least one will have enough network capacity to provide reliable e-mail service. Most Chinese factories have heavily polluting diesel generators to cope with blackouts of up to three days a week, because state-owned electricity companies have not added capacity fast enough to meet demand.
Meanwhile, Chinese investors have poured over $1 trillion in the last several years into loosely regulated trusts to bypass ultra-low deposit rates offered by state-owned banks. The banks cannot readily afford to pay more because they need fat margins to cover losses on loans to politically connected borrowers.
相关文章
For all the talk in recent years about the extent to which China has embraced capitalism, huge sectors of the economy still have not fully done so: those dominated by the country's 145,000 state-owned enterprises.
With China's top officials all in Beijing for the 18th Party Congress intended to put its seal of approval on the country's next generation of leaders, one of the toughest issues on their agenda lies in how to overhaul this sprawling empire.
Almost no one has much good to say about state-owned enterprises these days — not even the people who run them. Wang Yong, the director of the State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, which manages those belonging to the central government, chastised them publicly in a report to China's legislature on Oct. 24.
"More efforts will be made to reform the power, telecommunications, oil and petrochemical industries," Mr. Wang said. "Market entry into these sectors will be expanded based on the development of these industries." But whether those efforts will amount to more than window dressing depends on the willingness of the next Chinese leadership team to challenge the politically connected families who often run state-owned enterprises. And given the lavish opportunities these enterprises provide for insider corruption and self-dealing, that remains very much an open question.
On Thursday, at the opening of the party congress, outgoing President Hu Jintao seemed to be suggesting placing some limits on state-owned enterprises and creating more of a level playing field for private companies that try to compete against them. But two political advisers to the incoming leadership, with a deep knowledge of the factional rivalries in the Communist Party, expressed strong skepticism that most state-owned enterprises have much to fear.
The national government as well as provincial and local governments are financially dependent on the profits of such enterprises and are reluctant to give them up, they said. At the same time, the state enterprises provide political patronage for factions of the Communist Party and lower-level cadres, whose ongoing support is crucial to the government.
State-owned enterprises are also very important as providers of blue-collar jobs and as the operators of about 8,000 schools, hospitals and community centers for their current and former employees and their families.
Companies in which the state owns at least a majority represent 35 percent of all business activity in China, according to official figures. Yet they earned 43 percent of profits last year in China. Their hammerlock on a long list of strategic industries has allowed them to charge relatively high prices for their goods and services even as they borrow at artificially low interest rates from state-owned banks.
To be sure, the pressure for change is building. Factional struggles ahead of the Party Congress have opened the way for a national debate over state-owned enterprises. A wide range of economists say further liberalization of the portions of the economy still dominated by the state is essential to long-term growth.
"Without fundamental reforms the country's economic prospect will dim with a diminished chance to leap into the ranks of developed economies," said Fred Hu, a former economist at the International Monetary Fund and Goldman Sachs who is now the founder and chairman of Primavera Capital, a large private equity fund based in Beijing. "Only bold reforms could fully unleash the country's enormous potential and entrepreneurial energy and propel China into the first world."
Public support for economic reform makes it impossible for the incoming team simply to do nothing, said one of the two political advisers, both of whom insisted on anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue within China. But the new team may limit its actions to the privatization of some state-owned manufacturers, like steel mills, which do not have monopolies and are frequently in sectors with overcapacity, ferocious competition and heavy financial losses.
A few top executives in the auto industry have also begun calling for a limit on further investments in that sector, which also faces severe overcapacity. The government has also been doing considerably more detailed audits of state-owned enterprises this year, seeking signs of fraud or corruption.
But the broader network of state-owned enterprises in the service sector, from telecommunications and banking to health care and electricity distribution, is likely to remain "virtually unchanged" for the next few years, the political adviser said.
"It's going to be very difficult to do," agreed Roderick MacFarquhar, a Harvard professor who is one of the best-known experts on contemporary China from outside the country. "They've kept a very low profile for so long, they don't know how to do anything else."
The new leadership has just as many ties to state-owned enterprises as the old. The brother of Li Keqiang, who is expected to become the next prime minister, is one of four deputy directors of the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration. With 98 percent of the Chinese market for cigarettes, the state-owned tobacco administration generates taxes and profits that total 7 to 10 percent of the entire revenues of the central government, according to a report in late October from the Brookings Institution in Washington.
China has a growing anti-smoking movement, but it has little support from the government. The Brookings report said that a "change in mindset on the part of the leadership, especially the highly misleading and one-sided perception of tobacco as a 'cash cow' and major contributor to the Chinese economy, is a prerequisite for policy change."
The tobacco administration declined to comment, and declined to make Mr. Li's brother, Li Keming, available for an interview.
For all the pessimism about far-reaching reform, there is still considerable discussion of possible ways that state-owned enterprises might be changed if the new leadership decides to tackle the thorny political issues involved.
One of the most influential proposals within the Chinese leadership in the past few months is from Chen Qingtai, the deputy director of the Chinese cabinet's Development Research Center. Mr. Chen's paper calls for the government to become essentially an investor in state-owned enterprises, instead of actively managing them and selecting the management teams for each enterprise.
While useful in the past in advancing big projects like the Three Gorges Dam, Mr. Chen suggested in his paper, the government should now move more aggressively to sell off its ownership in sectors like steel that face overcapacity, redeploying that capital to emerging industries. He called for the state to hire more professional financial administrators to manage this process.
Mr. Hu seemed to endorse this stance on Thursday, saying that, "we should separate government administration from the management of enterprises, state assets, public institutions and social organizations."
But there is little sign of a consensus yet.
"I think there are definitely different schools of thought" inside the government, said a manager at a company looking closely at acquiring possible stakes in state-owned enterprises if they are privatized. "What they actually choose to do will also depend on the courage of the new leadership."
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