Choosing a Policy Framework to Change Fiscal Decentralization to Promote Economic Growth in the Condition of Economic Restructuring

Revenue commensurate with expenditure tasks will create initiative for local authorities, thereby creating optimal efficiency in resource allocation.

4.3. Choosing a policy framework to change fiscal decentralization to promote economic growth in the context of economic restructuring

4.3.1. General orientation


The 2011-2020 socio-economic development strategy approved by the 11th Party Congress clearly stated: “ Transforming the growth model from mainly extensive development to a balanced development between extensive and intensive development, both expanding the scale and focusing on improving quality, efficiency and sustainability. Restructuring the economy …” (Documents of the 11th Party Congress, p.107).

Implementing the strategic orientation of the 11th Party Congress, the 3rd Conference of the Party Central Committee (11th tenure) set out the general goal for the 5 years 2011 - 2015 as: Rapid and sustainable economic development, associated with innovation of the growth model and restructuring the economy towards improving quality, efficiency and competitiveness. Accordingly, in the next 5 years, the economy will be restructured in 3 important areas: (i) restructuring investment with a focus on public investment; (ii) restructuring state-owned enterprises with a focus on economic groups and state-owned corporations; (iii) restructuring the financial market with a focus on the commercial banking system and financial institutions.

Along with economic restructuring, administrative reform to meet the requirements of the restructuring process is an urgent requirement. In fact, the policy of reforming the Vietnamese state administration has been carried out since the late 1980s, associated with the beginning of the country's renovation process according to the path of developing a socialist-oriented market economy.

and building a rule-of-law state of the people, by the people, for the people. The context of developing a market economy and opening up and international integration has created an objective need to carry out the reform of the state administration. Building a system of state administrative agencies from the central to the grassroots level that is transparent, clean, strong, modern, effective, efficient, increasing democracy and the rule of law in the operations of the Government and state administrative agencies to create a new modern administration, in line with the economic regime, promoting social democracy and international integration. That is also mentioned in the platform during the transition period to socialism: " Ensuring the principle of democratic centralism, unification of power, division of labor, decentralization, and at the same time ensuring unified direction from the central government. The implementation of this policy is maintained systematically and developed in the following documents of the Party, with assessments, summaries, directions and methods of implementation. Promoting central-local decentralization, including fiscal decentralization, becomes a guiding viewpoint and ideology in building laws and perfecting the state apparatus " (1991 Platform revised in 2011, 2011).


In particular, entering the early years of the 21st century, the Government also began to realize that the old system and old methods had become outdated, making the public sector less effective, so it made necessary changes to promote global competition. Accordingly, the Government issued Decision No. 136/QD-TTg dated September 17, 2001 to plan the overall program of state administrative reform for the period 2001 - 2010. For the first time in the reform process, the Government introduced a long-term strategic program, clearly identifying four reform areas: institutional reform, organizational reform, building and developing the contingent of cadres and civil servants, and public finance reform .

The section on organizational reform includes the reform of the local government apparatus with the following tasks: clear and reasonable decentralization between the central and local levels, distinguishing the functions and tasks of urban and rural governments, and rationally organizing the People's Council and People's Committee. Resolution No. 08/2004/NQ-CP dated June 30, 2004 of the Government on continuing to promote decentralization of state management between the Government and the governments of provinces and centrally run cities has oriented to prioritize decentralization in the following areas: management of planning, planning and development investment; management of the state budget; management of career activities, public services, etc. Regarding the distinction between state management contents in urban and rural areas, the specific regulations for some special urban areas have been institutionalized to a certain extent when amending the Law on Organization of People's Councils and People's Committees, the 2001 Capital Ordinance and Decree No. 93/2001/ND-CP dated December 12, 2001 on decentralization of management of some areas to Ho Chi Minh City, which creates initiative for the City People's Committee to manage investment in socio-economic development and budget associated with the urban characteristics of the locality.


Following that, the Government issued Resolution No. 30/NQ-CP dated November 8, 2011 promulgating the state administrative reform program for the period 2011 - 2020. The focus of administrative reform in the next 10 years is: Institutional reform; building and improving the quality of cadres, civil servants and public employees, focusing on reforming salary policies to create real motivation for cadres, civil servants and public employees to perform public duties with high quality and efficiency; improving the quality of administrative services and public services . According to Article 3, Clause 2 of Resolution 30: " Perfecting the decentralization mechanism, ensuring unified management of national resources and minerals; planning and having development orientation; strengthening supervision, inspection and examination; at the same time, promoting the proactive role, sense of responsibility, improving the capacity of each

level, each sector ”. Along with the process of perfecting administrative decentralization, fiscal decentralization between the central and local levels must also have innovations to meet new requirements. Accordingly, the direction of fiscal decentralization to localities in the coming time of our Party and State includes:


Firstly , to make a clearer separation between budget levels, aiming to build a more complete fiscal hierarchy, in which local governments have greater autonomy and decision-making power over their own budgets and are relatively independent from the central government, including both revenue sources and expenditure tasks. Accordingly, all issues of budget preparation, allocation and settlement of each level should be decided by that level. The higher-level budget only aggregates the lower-level budget into the general state budget. That will increase accountability at each level of government, while overcoming the high hierarchy and integration of the state budget system, encouraging localities to exploit their advantages and nurture local revenue sources.

Second , give localities greater autonomy in deciding and managing revenue sources. Increasing revenue autonomy for localities is currently an objective requirement in line with the requirements of fiscal decentralization, while also creating revenue sources more commensurate with the spending tasks of each level of local government.

Third , expanding local autonomy in spending decisions. Expanding local autonomy in spending decisions is based on the principle that spending is done at the level of government that directly provides public services most effectively. Avoiding the situation where the same spending task is divided among too many levels without clearly defined boundaries, leading to unclear accountability and overlap and pushing between levels of government. In the specific conditions of Vietnam,

In Vietnam today, expanding local spending autonomy should begin with allowing local governments an appropriate level of autonomy in making spending decisions based on local priorities. However, local priorities must be consistent with national strategies and goals. At the same time, it is necessary to allow localities to decide on spending regimes and norms according to the principle of overall fiscal discipline.

Fourth , Vietnam's current fiscal decentralization policy does not distinguish between urban and rural areas, so the general direction in fiscal decentralization must be based on the difference between urban and rural areas (Currently, the Law on Organization of People's Councils and People's Committees, although amended, has not yet clarified the difference in authority between local government levels, between People's Councils and People's Committees at the same level and the content of state management in general, fiscal management in particular in the territory (rural, urban, island, mountainous areas)). Specialized legal documents have not thoroughly resolved the decentralization relationship and lack stability.

Fifth , enhance transparency and accountability in local government finances. Decentralization can only be effective if it is accompanied by transparency and accountability in local governments. To do so, appropriate mechanisms must be in place to enhance transparency and accountability both externally and internally.

4.3.2. Perfecting the fiscal decentralization policy


Based on the principles and orientations of the Party and State on fiscal decentralization, and from the research results in chapter 3, the thesis proposes groups of solutions to improve fiscal decentralization to promote economic growth in Vietnam. If these groups of solutions are fully implemented,

Synchronization can bring certain effects in promoting economic growth in Vietnam.

4.3.2.1. Reform of revenue decentralization


The results of Model 3 show that revenue decentralization has a positive impact on economic growth. Therefore, to reap the full benefits of fiscal decentralization in Vietnam, it will require reform of revenue decentralization at the provincial level and below. In addition to having sufficient budget revenues to cover the public spending needs of local governments, the most important benefit of revenue decentralization is to increase the accountability of local governments to their local people. This will be achieved fundamentally by granting local governments a significant degree of tax autonomy.

In order to propose fundamental solutions to the reform of revenue decentralization and to enhance the autonomy of local governments, it is necessary to see the main features of the reform. Accordingly, it is necessary to realize that it will not be possible to ensure that all local government expenditures are covered by autonomous tax sources. Instead, the goal is that all local governments will be able to increase their budgets through greater tax collection efforts. The budget from revenue sharing and additional revenues will only be sufficient to cover mandatory expenditure tasks. In practice, this will be expressed in the rule that separate revenues must finance the expenditure needs (excluding conditional transfers) of the richest local governments, while the budget needs of relatively poorer local governments must be balanced by additional regulatory payments. Many components of this formula are now mentioned in the 2002 NS Law. What is lacking in Vietnam's fiscal decentralization system is the autonomy

Tax autonomy and the granting of a significant degree of tax autonomy will be the main driving force of the reform of budget revenue collection tasks. However, not all forms of tax autonomy are implemented equally. From the analysis of experience and the principle of revenue decentralization as above, the best way to grant tax autonomy to local governments is to apply a fixed list of taxes whose tax rates local governments can prescribe within the minimum and maximum limits, as prescribed by the National Assembly. Local governments are not allowed to change any other aspects of taxes such as determining taxable areas. Thus, based on the State's orientation, international experience, and the regression results from Chapter 3, we would like to propose the following solutions related to enhancing decentralization of state budget revenue collection:

First , create some self-generated revenue for the locality.


According to international practice, if a local government has full authority or significant control over a tax, fee or charge, that tax is considered a local tax. However, according to that principle, currently, local governments in Vietnam have almost no source of revenue of their own. Therefore, given the characteristics of Vietnam, allowing localities to issue their own tax or change the current tax structure may not have an effect on economic growth, or even have the opposite effect. This may lead to tax competition among localities and create barriers to the free movement of factors. At the same time, due to the weak management, enforcement and supervision capacity of local government officials, if decisions on tax are given, it will lead to monopoly and arbitrariness, causing inefficiency. However, it is also necessary to gradually grant local autonomy in tax at a relatively limited level. This will facilitate localities to exploit their own sources of revenue, reducing dependence.

passively to the central government, increasing local initiative in performing assigned tasks according to law.

According to the general principle of revenue decentralization, autonomy is given to

Localities need to focus on a number of taxes with basic characteristics:

- The tax base is relatively immobile.

- Tax revenues are adequate to meet local needs and tend to increase (at least at the rate of expenditure).

- Stable and predictable tax revenue.

- Relatively easy to manage.

- The tax burden is not transferred to non-local residents.

According to Sah (1998), the general experience of decentralizing taxes to federal, state and local levels is shown as follows:

Table 4.1 : Revenue classification of countries in the world


Tax Type

Determine tax base

Tax rates and tax collection

Tax management

Customs duties

F

F

F

Corporate income tax

F

F

F

Resource tax (profit, income)

F

F

F

Wealth Tax (Capital, Wealth, Transfer Tax)

transfer of property, inheritance and sacrifice)

F

FS

F

Payroll tax

FS

FS

FS

Multi-phase sales tax

(VAT)

F

F

F

Sales tax at one stage (production, wholesale, retail)

- Option A

- Option B

SF

SL S

SL S

Special consumption tax

FS

FS

FS

Lottery tax

SL

SL

SL

Environmental Pollution Tax

FSL

FSL

FSL

Motor fuel tax

FSL

FSL

FSL

Waste fee

FSL

FSL

FSL

Road tax

FSL

FSL

FSL

Parking fee

L

L

L

Motor Vehicle Tax

S

S

S

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Choosing a Policy Framework to Change Fiscal Decentralization to Promote Economic Growth in the Condition of Economic Restructuring

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