author: Fu Yifu, the original title: “Development and Reform Commission official propaganda! These cities have to settle down without a threshold, what economic changes will it bring? “, the head picture comes from: Visual China
The reform of household registration has taken another big step forward.
Recently, the National Development and Reform Commission issued the “Key Tasks for New Urbanization and Urban-Rural Integration Development in 2021” (hereinafter referred to as “Tasks”), The content covers promoting the orderly and effective integration of agricultural migrants into cities, improving the carrying capacity of urban agglomerations and metropolitan areas, promoting the coordinated development of large, medium and small cities and small towns, accelerating the construction of modern cities, improving the level of urban governance, and accelerating the development of urban-rural integration. On the one hand, the biggest bright spot is the expression on the reform of the household registration system:
“Cities with a permanent population of less than 3 million in urban areas will implement a comprehensive cancellation of settlement restrictions.”
It is worth noting that in the previously announced “14th Five-Year Plan”, the relevant expression is “total removal of the urban settlement restrictions for urban permanent residents below 3 million”; and this “task” particularly highlights “implementation.” The two words signify that the cancellation of settlement restrictions has come to a level that must be strictly enforced, and there can be no more ambiguity.
The weight is obvious.
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Which cities have “implemented the complete cancellation of settlement restrictions”?
According to the description of “Mission”, the measurement standard here is “urban permanent population”, not the entire population or the population of municipal districts.
For the specific classification of cities, referring to the “Notice on Adjusting the Standards for Urban Size Classification” issued by the State Council in November 2014, cities with a permanent population of 1 to 5 million are large cities, of which 3 to 5 million The city is a type I large city, and the city with 1 million to 3 million is a type II large city; the city with a permanent population of 5 to 10 million is a megacities; a city with a permanent population of more than 10 million is a megacities; Those below 1 million belong to small and medium-sized cities.
In other words, except for super-large, mega-cities, and some large cities, all other cities must implement a complete cancellation of residence restrictions.system.
Based on the relevant data in the “Urban Construction Statistical Yearbook”, as of the end of 2019, there are 30 large cities, megacities, and megacities with a permanent population of more than 3 million in urban areas across the country; among them, the megacities include Shanghai, Beijing, Chongqing, There are 6 cities in Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Tianjin. Mega cities include 10 cities in Dongguan, Wuhan, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Nanjing, Zhengzhou, Xi’an, Jinan, Shenyang and Qingdao. Large cities(Type I) includes 14 cities in Harbin, Changchun, Dalian, Hefei, Kunming, Taiyuan, Changsha, Suzhou, Nanning, Urumqi, Shijiazhuang, Xiamen, Ningbo, and Fuzhou.
Except for the above 30 cities, all other cities will truly achieve “zero threshold for settlement”-among them, there are many provincial capitals such as Guiyang, Nanchang, Lanzhou, Shijiazhuang, and Wuxi and Foshan. Member of “Yi Club”.
With the blooming of “zero threshold settlement”, my country’s urban economy will enter a new stage of competition and development.
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What can the “zero threshold settlement” bring?
The answer is a higher level of marketization and urbanization.
Let’s talk about marketization first.
As we all know, in recent years, affected by various factors, my country’s macroeconomic downward pressure has been increasing, and a sudden new crown pneumonia epidemic has severely damaged the global supply chain system and aggravated the uncertainty of the world economy. Despite the efforts of all parties and the unity of the whole country, we were able to quickly control the epidemic in a short period of time, take the lead in promoting the resumption of work and production in all walks of life, and become the only major economy in the world to achieve positive economic growth in 2020. , But if you want to continue to promote the national economyFor high-quality and sustainable development, we are bound to further stimulate the economic vitality of the domestic market.
Because of this, the country is paying more and more attention to the status of the market. It not only changed the “basic role” of the market in resource allocation to a “decisive role” at the Third Plenary Session of the Eighteenth Central Committee, but also publicly and officially The document repeatedly emphasizes the importance of the market, spares no effort to support the development of the private economy and SMEs, and strives to optimize the business environment.
From the perspective of regional economy and urban economy, the “zero threshold for settlement” reflects our ambition to further promote market-oriented reforms, and it has far-reaching significance:
On the one hand, people’s free migration and settlement to earn a living will no longer be restricted, especially those who live in rural areas and a large number of surplus labor can be transferred out in an orderly manner. The mismatch of labor supply and demand between different regions will also Significant improvement has been achieved, and the construction of a “national unified market” will also be greatly accelerated;
On the other hand, the essence of the difference in household registration is the difference in a series of welfare systems. Nowadays, the “dual household registration” is about to become history. The various benefits and privileges attached to the household registration will also be weakened day by day, and the status of different people will be More equal, development opportunities are also more equal-these are also the meaning of the market economy.
Let’s talk about urbanization.
The so-called urbanization means that with the development of industrialization, non-agricultural industries continue to gather in cities and towns, so that the rural population continues to shift to non-agricultural industries and urban areas, rural areas are transformed into urban areas, the number and scale of urban areas increase, and urban production The historical process of the continuous spread of lifestyle and urban civilization to the countryside. International experience has repeatedly shown that the advancement of urbanization has a positive impact on industrial upgrading, improvement of people’s livelihood, technological progress and regional coordinated development.
Since the reform and opening up, although the majority of farmers in our country have the right to choose their own jobs, they often fail to change their status after entering the city due to household registration issues, which restricts the further transfer of rural surplus labor and the integration of urban and rural areas. And the fundamental improvement of farmers’ living conditions.
However, under the new background of “zero threshold to settle down”, after a peasant enters the city, his identity and the benefits he can enjoy will be truly changed, and his income will be greatly increased, which will definitely be reversed. Coming over to continue to drive the in-depth advancement of my country’s urbanization, and then to promote the higher-quality development of the national economy, the prospects are extremely anticipated.
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Cancel dropAlthough the household restriction is gratifying, it is not done once and for all, because it is not the only bargaining chip for the city to attract people to live and develop here.
In recent years, the “grabbing wars” between cities in my country have been in full swing. Many second-tier cities have adopted extremely preferential policies to attract talents to settle in, including “zero threshold for settlement.” However, “grabbing people” is simple, but “retaining people” is not easy. Even though the second-tier cities are good in every way, many young people still choose to “return” to the first-tier cities. The reason is that talents value more, whether there is a place where talent can be used and enough room for growth, rather than a place to settle down. This objectively requires that the pace of industrial development in each city must keep up.
Not only that, but the difference in urban welfare cannot be ignored.
Currently, my country’s urban welfare is mainly divided into two categories: one is household registration welfare, including employment security, children’s education, medical care, housing, social security and a series of competitive public goods. These benefits are obtained based on The household registration itself requires residents to obtain a local household registration to be able to enjoy; the second is non-residential welfare, including a series of non-competitive public goods such as urban infrastructure, informal employment opportunities, order, information, environment, and cultural atmosphere. Workers only need to come to this city to enjoy. The difference in non-hukou benefits among residents of different cities depends on the difference in the level of economic and social development between cities.
The migration of the population must follow the principle of seeking advantages and avoiding disadvantages. Even if there is no household registration restriction, everyone can move freely, but most people will still prefer to choose the city that can bring them the greatest increase in welfare, namely Total benefits including household registration benefits and non-household registration benefits.
However, in reality, we often see the plot that although the threshold for household registration in big cities is very high, and household registration benefits are out of reach for the foreign population, people still flock to it; although the small city has already fully liberalized the foreign population Settled, but often no one cares.
I would rather be a non-registered resident in a big city than a registered resident in a small city. Behind the phenomenon is the disorder of population migration in my country, which is also not conducive to the reversal of labor imbalances in various regions and the advancement of coordinated development.
Because of the above, if we want to truly realize the reasonable allocation of human resources at the regional level, so that people in all regions can make the best use of their talents, in addition to household registration, we should also vigorously promote the development of small and medium-sized cities and minimize their The economic and social development gap between the city and the big cities will reduce the difference in non-residential welfare between residents in different cities. Only in this way can more and more people be willing to take root in small and medium-sized cities and promote the coordinated development of various regions.
The collapse of the household registration wall is just the beginning. We still have a lot to do.