从模仿到创新的路径研究与中国经验

【作者】 魏枫；

【导师】 张平；

【作者基本信息】 中国社会科学院研究生院 ， 政治经济学， 2009， 博士

【摘要】 凭借着自身改革以来强劲的经济增长,中国在世界经济和国际事务上的影响力,在过去的三十年中迅速的扩大。对一些人来说这是个威胁,对另一些人来说这又是希望之所在。我们自己则更需头脑清醒,并对这些问题——中国经济所经历的增长究竟是在沿着什么样的路径前进;今后的中国应更多的继续模仿国外先进技术设备来推进本国的技术进步,还是转而下大力气提高自主创新能力;作为发展中国家,中国经济实现快速发展是否具有一般意义,对于众多发展中国家而言,能否借鉴中国经验来实现本国经济赶超等等——给出解答。新古典增长理论认为经济增长过程受到资本边际报酬递减规律的制约,最终实现稳态。给定人口增长率和资本折旧率保持不变,新增投资将主导着人均资本,进而决定着经济总体的增长速度。尽管在稳态处,各人均变量的增长率为零,但如果考虑无意识的干中学效应,或者是知识所具有的非竞争特性对经济产生的正外部性,并能够弥补资本边际报酬递减的情况,即使没有任何技术进步,人均产出也可以实现长期增长,而且,更高的投资水平(或更高的储蓄率)会导致更高的长期人均增长率。内生经济增长理论认为技术进步是经济增长的最终推动因素,而技术进步则是主要来源于企业或者国家的研发活动,所以一般而言实现技术进步的研发活动的费用支出占GDP比重与技术进步之间应正相关,投入越多,研发成功的可能性就会越大,进而研发费用与经济增长率正相关。但是,这两类增长理论如果直接被用来分析和解释中国的增长路径,则存在显著的缺陷,它们的前提假设均不能完全适合发展中国所面临的情况。一方面,新古典经济增长理论没有充分考虑资本投资异质性的情况,而中国每年新增的机器设备均包含着相对于现有资本存量更为先进的技术,物化性技术设备占据全社会技术进步的主要形式。另一方面,内生经济增长理论解释的多为发达国家的增长问题,所考虑的自主研发为推进技术进步的主要形式,忽略了中国可以借助模仿来实现技术进步的可能性。不同于内生增长理论主要强调创新对于技术进步的推动作用,我们扩展了技术进步的来源,即中国因改革开放初期技术水平较低,远离世界技术前沿,而增加的模仿国外先进技术来推动技术进步。此时,模仿与创新均可被视为实现技术进步的手段。通过投资于技术更为先进的国外机器设备而进行的模仿,同样可以带来技术进步,消减通常意义的规模报酬递减,发挥与创新相同的作用,并实现经济的快速增长。在我们总结中国经济增长的典型化事实中,设备进口和研发费用投入对经济增长的促进作用都具有显著地阶段性特征。基于对这些增长事实的观察,我们判断中国经济如果能够顺利实现赶超,其技术进步路径将会大致依次经历如下三个阶段:模仿阶段、由模仿向创新过渡阶段和创新阶段。模仿阶段以进口世界先进技术设备为推动技术进步的主要形式,创新阶段以独立自主研发为推动技术进步的主要形式,二者转换推动技术进步的主体地位,发生在由模仿到创新的过渡阶段。在本文的理论部分,为更好的解释中国的经济增长过程,我们构造了一个新古典与内生增长理论的综合体,来说明中国技术进步路径的内在演进机制。这里的技术进步不再是外生给定,而是经济主体追求利润最大化的有意识的结果,强调企业家是技术进步的推动者是本文贯彻始终的微观基础。尽管在本文模型中,资本积累扮演了重要角色,但是最终实现经济增长的决定因素还是技术进步。厂商将要决定是采用模仿还是采用创新来推动技术进步,这些决策要受制于该国技术水平与世界技术前沿的距离。当该国远离世界技术前沿时,厂商进行模仿来推进技术更为有利;随着技术差距的不断缩小,创新开始变得更为有利可图。对于初始技术水平较低的发展中国家,只有当技术水平发展到一定程度,此时的模仿成本足够高以后,其国内的厂商才有可能选择创新来实现技术进步。随着该国技术水平继续靠近世界前沿,模仿成本不断提高,使得越来越多的厂商选择自主创新来推进技术进步,整体经济的技术进步路径也就随之发生变化,技术进步由原来的基于向国外先进技术的模仿来实现,转而依靠国内的自主研发来实现。同时,模型中的转移动态分析表明,当某些条件不能得到满足时,动力系统的稳态点就会使得技术进步路径收敛到模仿阶段,国家也因此会陷于经济停滞,我们将这种状态称为模仿陷阱。至此,我们的分析将适用于所有初始技术水平较低的发展中国家,模型的增长路径不仅仅能够解释一些发展中国家经济如何实现赶超,还能够给出另一些发展中国家发展缓慢,甚至停滞的原因。模型中模仿阶段的比较静态分析具有明显的政策含义,政府可以通过扭曲本国生产要素价格和本币贬值,提高企业获利能力,这对于陷入模仿陷阱的国家摆脱经济停滞状态极为有效,亦能够加快赶超国家的增长速度。经济增长前沿课题组(2003)发现中国改革以来所实现的高速增长得益于低成本的竞争优势,将中国的增长归纳为“低价工业化增长模式”,认为“低成本是工业化的核心竞争力,这包括劳动力成本低、土地价格低以及实际税收低。”而本文的数理模型则可以被视作上述研究的继续,说明低价工业化的阶段最优性。此外,本文在对赶超经济体所要经历的技术进步路径的整体分析基础上,还分别基于全国总量和省际数据的统计与计量分析,对当前中国所处技术进步路径的具体阶段做出判断。认为中国由模仿到创新的过渡阶段业已来临。这样,当前中国经济增长所面临的问题,也由此得到方向性的解答。对外模仿、吸引外资对于经济增长的促进作用将会出现下降,而自主研发对于经济增长的贡献会显著上升。要保持经济长期稳定地增长,政府应逐渐减低对经济的扭曲,将生产资源的定价权逐步交还给市场。做出这样的政策转变,恰逢其时。更多还原

【Abstract】 By virtue of its strong economic growth since Chinese reform and opening-up, the China’s influence to the world expands rapidly in the past three decades. For some, this is a threat, for others it is a hope. Should be clear of we on these issues - what kind of growth path China’s economic growth has taken; and for further growth, we should more continue to imitate foreign advanced technology and equipment to promote the country’s technological progress, or turn to get efforts to improve the capability of independent innovation; as a developing country, whether the experience of rapid development of China’s economy have a general sense; whether other developing countries can learn from Chinese experience to achieve the country’s economic catch-up and so on - giving answers to .Neo-classical growth theory suggests that the process of economic growth is subjected to the law of diminishing marginal returns of capital, and achieves steady state ultimately. Given the rates of population growth and capital depreciation unchanged, new investment will dominate the growth rate of per capita capital and economy. Although the growth rate of per capita variables is zero at the steady-state of basic model, the extended model, which considers the possibility of learning by doing and the characteristics of knowledge that may be able to make up for diminishing marginal returns of capital, can realize the long-term growth of per capita output, even without any technological progress. Moreover, higher the level of investment (or a higher savings rate) will lead to a higher long-term per capita growth rate. Endogenous growth theory suggests that technological progress is a final factor to promote economic growth, and mainly derived from enterprises’or national R&D activities. Generally, it should be a positive correlation between technological progresses and R&D input divided by GDP. The more R&D input, the bigger rate of economic growth we can get.However, there are significant deficiencies in these two types of growth theory when they are used to analyze and interpret the path of China’s growth, because their assumptions are not completely suitable for the development of the situation faced by Chinese. On the one hand, neo-classical theory of economic growth have not been fully taken into account the heterogeneity of capital investment, while annual increments of Chinese machinery and equipment are included in the existing capital stock compared with the more advanced technology, and embodied technical change may occupy the main forms of technological progress. On the other hand, endogenous growth theory applies to developed countries, which emphases R & D is the main form to promote technological progress, ignored the possibility that China can make use of imitation to achieve technological progress.At the beginning of its reform and opening up, China has a lower level of skills away from the world technological frontier. Different from endogenous growth theory, which emphasizes innovation as a major role in promoting technological progress, we have expanded the sources of technological progress and added imitation as another role to promote technological progress. Here, imitation and innovation is indifference as a means to achieve technological progress. The adoption of more advanced technology of foreign machinery and equipments, can play the same role as the innovation, and achieve rapid economic growth. We summarize the facts of China’s economic growth, and there is a significant phase characteristics for equipment and R&D to promote economic growth. Based on those observations, we believe, if the Chinese economy could be successfully catch up with and surpass advanced world levels, the technological progress path would be following three stages: imitation phase, the transition from imitation to innovation phase and innovation phase. During imitation phase, the main form of technological progress is importing equipments embodied advanced technology. During innovation phase, the main form is independent input of R&D. Between the two phases is a transitional phase, where the two main forms converse.In the theoretical part of this article, we develop a hybrid neoclassical / endogenous growth model that both endogenous capital accumulation and endogenous technological progress in one model, to explain the evolution of the internal mechanism about the path of Chinese technological progress. Here, technological progress is no longer a given value exogenously, but a result of economic agents maximizing their profits. Emphasizing entrepreneurs’behavior in this article is our consistent microeconomic foundation. Even though capital accumulation played an important role, but eventually it is technological progress that realize economic growth. The entrepreneur has to decide to undertake either imitative or innovative activities, which subjected to the distance between the country’s and the world technology technological level. When the country’s distance is far away from frontier, it is more profitable for the entrepreneur to choose imitation. While closer to the technique frontier of the world, imitation becomes harder to succeed than innovation. For the developing countries, the entrepreneur needs to have a minimum technological level, where the costs of imitation are high enough, to carry out innovation. The level of costs of imitation rises as the economy moves closer to the technological frontier, enabling more entrepreneurs to be engaged in an innovation-based strategy, and consequently, moving the economy from a technological structure that is based on imitation of foreign technologies to one where domestic innovation dominates. At the same time, the analysis of the model shows that, when certain conditions are not met, the dynamic system will cause convergence during imitation stage, and the country will face a result of economic stagnation, which we call as imitation trap. Our analysis will apply to all developing countries with initial lower level of technology. For developing countries, our model about growth path can not only explain how to achieve catching up, but also be able to give the causes of stagnation.The comparative static analysis has obvious policy implications. The Government can twist the factors prices and devaluate its currency, to improve entrepreneur’s profitability, which is highly effective help the country get out of economic stagnation and speed up the growth rate of catch-up country. Economic Growth Frontier Subject Team (2003) found that China’s rapid growth benefits from low-cost competitive advantage, which is summed up as "low-cost industrial growth pattern". They believe "low-cost are the core facts to industrialize, which including low labor costs, low land prices and actual tax rate." The mathematical model of this article can be regarded as a continuation of the study shows that low-cost industrialization is optimal during the specific period.In addition, based on statistical and econometrical analysis with the national and inter-provincial panel data, we get the conclusion that the transition phase from imitation to innovation for China is coming. Hence the current problems to be faced by China’s economic growth will be answered correspondingly. The influence of outward imitation and attracting foreign investment to promote economic growth will decline, and the contribution of independent R&D to economic growth will be increased significantly. To maintain long-term and stable economic growth, the government should gradually reduce the distortions, pricing of productive resources will gradually be returned to the market. To make such a policy change, it is the right time.更多还原