Time to revisit economic rationale for industrial policy and subsidies

是时候重新认识产业政策与补贴背后的经济原理了

（来源：《中国日报》2023-11-08）

The global economy has reached a new critical juncture, where techno-nationalist industrial policies are regaining popularity, while de-risking and the fragmentation of global value chains seem to be the unfolding reality. At this point, we need to revisit the economic rationale for industrial policy, from the triple perspective of theory, history and policy.

全球经济已到达一个全新的关键时刻，技术民族主义的产业政策正重新获得青睐，去风险化与全球价值链的碎片化是必然趋势。在此，我们应当从理论、历史与政策三方面重新认识产业政策的经济原理。

The developed world, particularly the United States, used to favor laissez-faire over government intervention and aggressively promoted the free market doctrine, better known as the "Washington Consensus", among developing countries. Free-market advocates often dismiss the necessity for industrial policy, citing information barriers and potential rent-seeking as powerful arguments against it.

发达国家，尤其是美国，曾偏好自由放任而非政府干预，且积极地在发展中国家中推广自由市场学说，也即人们通常说的“华盛顿共识”。自由市场的倡导者往往否定产业政策的必要性，并认为信息壁垒和潜在的寻租是反对产业政策的有力论据。

However, in the face of the intensified competition for technological supremacy and increasing geopolitical complexity, and in order to address a variety of issues — competition with China, resilience of supply chains and green transition — there has been a self-conscious resurgence of industrial policy in the developed world in recent years, most notably industrial policy toward the semiconductor industry (as exemplified by the Chips and Science Act in the US, and the European Chips Act in the European Union).

然而，面对技术霸权的激烈竞争及日益复杂的地缘政治，且为了解决各色各样的问题——与中国的竞争、供应链的弹性和绿色转型之类——近年来，发达国家有意识地让产业政策重现天日，而最显著的当属针对半导体产业的产业政策（如美国的《芯片和科学法案》，以及欧盟的《欧洲芯片法案》）。

Through techno-nationalist semiconductor industrial policies, primarily in the form of direct subsidies and tax credits, all major developed economies in the world have been pushing for the "reshoring" of advanced chip manufacturing capacity, as well as the localization or friend-shoring of their respective semiconductor supply chains.

通过拥有浓厚技术民族主义色彩的、主要以直接补贴和税收免抵两种形式实现的半导体产业政策，全球所有主要发达经济体都在推动先进芯片制造能力的“回流”，以及半导体供应链的本地化或友岸外包。

While this process is still unfolding, the following phenomenon is already emerging: the global race among countries has led to the fragmentation of the global semiconductor value chains and markets, which in turn may result in halting innovations, increasing overcapacity and underutilization, and global technological bifurcation. It could even jeopardize the highly efficient business and innovation model of the semiconductor industry that has been operating on the basis of delicate specialization along the semiconductor GVC.

这一过程正在展开的同时，以下几种现象也已出现：全球国际竞争导致了全球半导体价值链与市场的分裂，而这可能会导致创新停止、产能过剩和利用不足的加剧，以及全球技术分化。它甚至可能危及半导体行业的高效商业和创新模式，而一直以来，这种模式以半导体全球价值链的微妙专业化为基础运作。

Poor industrial policy can stifle innovation, result in misallocation of capital, give rise to inefficiency, intensify market concentration and distortion, and waste valuable taxpayers' money. To economists, it has been of much interest to explore and identify, both theoretically and empirically (historically), the conditions (necessary and sufficient) under which the industrial policy can achieve its objectives, policy implementation can be made more efficient and welfare-enhancing and Pareto-improvement can be achieved.

糟糕的产业政策会扼杀创新，导致资本错配，导致效率低下，加剧市场集中和扭曲，浪费纳税人的宝贵资金。对于经济学家来说，从理论上和实证上（历史上）探索和确定产业政策能够实现其目标的条件（必要和充分）是很有意义的，政策执行的效率可以提高，福利增进和Pareto优化也得以实现。

In recent years, there has been a revival of scholarly interest in industrial policy (for a recent sample, see Willy C. Shih's September article in Harvard Business Review), and a substantial body of research has emerged that offers more robust empirical evidence on the functioning and impacts of industrial policy (for a review, see National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper 31538). This literature improves on the earlier empirical work, which was plagued by causal ambiguity and interpretational issues, and offers in general a much more positive take on industrial policy.

近年来，学术界对产业政策的兴趣重新燃起（最新样本参考Willy C. Shih在《哈佛商业评论》上发表的文章），并且有大量研究涌现，为产业政策的运作和影响提供了更有力的实证证据（相关评论，请参阅美国国家经济研究局第31538号工作文件）。这些文献改进了早期受到因果模糊和解释问题的困扰的实证工作，并且大体上对产业政策提出了更积极的看法。

More importantly, it provides a more nuanced and contextualized understanding of industrial policy, enabling economists to engage more productively in debates on the subject in a way that adds light rather than heat.

更重要的是，它提供了对产业政策更细致入微和情境化的理解，使经济学家能够以切中要害的方式更有效地参与关于该主题的辩论。

In a nutshell, while the early literature on East Asia's experience was sharply divided, more recent studies tend to demonstrate more convincingly that certain types of industrial policy have been quite effective in driving structural change in countries such as Japan, the Republic of Korea and China.

简言之，虽然关于东亚经验的早期文献存在严重分歧，但最近的研究倾向于以更令人信服的方式证明，某些类型的产业政策在推动日本、韩国和中国等国的转型升级这一方面非常有效。

However, these success stories are highly contextualized and sensitive to local opportunities and constraints, particularly institutional differences, and are difficult to generalize out of context, tending to call for a broadly strategic and dynamic approach to the industrial policy practice.

然而，这些成功案例高度依赖于其背景，对于当地的机会和制约因素——尤其是体制差异——极为敏感，难以一概而论，且往往要求对产业政策实践采取广泛的战略性、动态性方法。

Moreover, recent studies, too, tend to suggest that the debate on industrial policy should probably focus on how (how should industrial policy be implemented), rather than whether (whether governments should adopt industrial policy).

此外，最近的研究也倾向于表明，关于产业政策的辩论可能应该集中在“怎样”（如何实施产业政策）而不是“是否”（政府是否应该采取产业政策）上。

On the more practical policy side, various financial incentives, especially industrial subsidies, have been the major tools for implementing industrial policy. Amid the recent resurgence of techno-nationalistic industrial policy worldwide, the ramping up of subsidies by some of the world's largest economies has contributed to the significant increase in global trade tensions, raising concerns over the potential for subsidy wars — subsidy competition that leads to a race to the bottom.

在更实际的政策方面，各种财政激励措施，特别是产业补贴，一直是实施产业政策的主要工具。在最近全球技术民族主义产业政策的复兴中，世界上一些最大的经济体加大了补贴力度，导致全球贸易紧张局势大幅加剧，引发了人们对补贴战争可能性的担忧——补贴竞争往往会带来逐底竞争。

However, history, especially the period preceding the conclusion of the Tokyo Round Subsidies Code in 1979, has taught us that competitive subsidization leads to mutually wasteful expenditure and a lose-lose situation, thereby reducing the overall welfare of the world. In view of past experiences, it is essential that policy advisers and policy makers review the justifications for, and limits of, industrial subsidies, as well as the appropriate subsidization procedure.

然而，尤以1979年《东京回合补贴法》缔结之前的时期为主的历史告诉我们，竞争性补贴会导致相互浪费的支出和双输的局面，从而降低世界的整体福利。鉴于过去的经验，政策顾问和政策制定者必须审查工业补贴的理由和限制，以及适当的补贴程序。

Also, it's high time major economies worked together to reach a consensus on the rules governing industrial subsidies within a multilateral framework (for example, the World Trade Organization system), so as to prevent efficiency-weakening competitive subsidization. It is widely recognized that within the WTO system, there are strict rules (the Subsidies and Countervailing Measures Agreement) governing export subsidies and import substitution subsidies, but the rules for more general industrial subsides (that is, subsidies "specific" to a company, industry or group of industries) are at best a gray area (generally permitted yet actionable if found to cause adverse effects on trade).

同时，现在正是主要经济体应当共同努力，在多边框架（例如世界贸易组织体系）内就工业补贴规则达成共识的时候，这样才能防止削弱效率的竞争性补贴。人们普遍认识到，在世贸组织体系内，有严格的规则（《补贴和反补贴措施协定》）管理出口补贴和进口替代补贴，但更笼统的工业补贴（即“针对”某一公司、行业或产业集团的补贴）的规则充其量只是一个灰色地带（通常是被允许的，但如果发现它对贸易造成不利影响，就应当采取行动）。

In short, in the face of rising industrial policies across the globe, the world (and the WTO in particular) needs an updated toolbox. Fortunately, the major economies and international organizations (such as the WTO, International Monetary Fund, World Bank and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) seem to have taken note of the issues and have started to work in this direction.

简言之，面对全球不断上升的产业政策，世界（尤其是世贸组织）需要更有效的工具。幸运的是，主要经济体和国际组织（如世贸组织、国际货币基金组织、世界银行和经济合作与发展组织）似乎已经注意到了这些问题，并开始为应对它们而努力。

附：原文链接

https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202311/08/WS654ac9cca31090682a5ecf89.html