Research On Performance Evaluation Of Public Service Charges

Since the reform and opening up,the rapid development of China’s economy and society has promoted the increasing level of public demand for public services,and constantly put forward new requirements for the supply of public services.In order to solve the bottleneck in the supply of public services,governments at all levels are actively exploring the use of public service charges to make up for the cost of public service supply,and strive to provide the public with quality public services.However,with the continuous increase in public service charges,problems such as unreasonable pricing of some public services and non-compliant management of charges have frequently occurred.How to regulate public service charges has become a practical problem that needs to be solved urgently.The report of The 19 th session of national congress of the communist party of China clearly stated that“the establishment of a comprehensive,standardized,transparent,scientific and disciplined budget system and comprehensive implementation of performance management”,and In-depth promotion of the performance evaluation of public service charges,as an important part of the comprehensive implementation of performance management,has become a key measure to standardize public service charges and improve the level of public service supply.It is of great significance to promote the modernization of national governance system and governance capacity,deepen the reform of financial and tax system and establish a modern financial system.However,while China ’s performance evaluation of fiscal expenditure is vigorously developing,fiscal revenue performance evaluation has developed relatively slowly.As an important part of fiscal revenue,performance evaluation of public service charges has received little attention.How should the performance evaluation system for public service charges be established? How to set specific indexes and weights to better improve the charging management of public services? It has become an urgent problem.Based on the above background,this dissertation takes the public service performance evaluation of public service charges as the research object,discusses the construction of performance evaluation system of public service charges,and applies it in combination with practical cases.Public service charges are fees levied by the government or government-authorized units to specific beneficiaries of public services based on the principle of benefit.This dissertation limits the scope of public service charges to usage fees,not regular fees,which are service usage fees charged for specific beneficiaries.Performance evaluation of public service charges is based on public service charging as the evaluation object,following certain value judgment standards,and constructing a comprehensive evaluation of the whole process of public service charging through reasonable indicators.In essence,the performance evaluation of public service charges examines the supply of public services that meet public preferences at reasonable prices,and focuses on the two core issues of service financing and reasonable pricing.This dissertation builds a performance evaluation index system of public service charges based on four perspectives: governance,fiscal,economy and society.The theoretical basis for the selection of the four perspectives lies in: Fundamentally speaking,good public service charges are the issue of reasonable pricing and financing(financing financial funds)for public services that are suitable for charging on the premise of following the basic principles of good governance.At the power level,public service charges are the rational use of public power by the government to guide,standardize and maintain the allocation of resources between the public and private sectors,to achieve effective supply of public services,and to meet the public needs of the public.Therefore,the performance evaluation of public service charges should be investigated the rational use of public power in public service charges forms the performance evaluation of public service charges from the perspective of governance;at the resource level,public service charges aim at providing public services that meet public preferences at reasonable prices,focusing on service financing and reasonable pricing two core issues.Service financing is to raise funds for public services that are suitable for charging,and reasonable pricing is to promote the efficient allocation and full use of scarce resources.At the same time,taking into account the special nature of public services,on the basis of the principle of “who benefits,who pays”,public service charges should also consider the affordability of low-income earners to ensure social equality.Based on this,service financing,reasonable pricing and social equity should also become the content of performance evaluation of public service charges.This article forms the fiscal,economy and society perspectives of performance evaluation of public service charges.Based on the governance perspective,good public service charges should satisfy the five basic principles of good governance—legal authorization,fiduciary responsibility,transparency,predictability and public participation,which constitute the main content of the performance evaluation of public service charges from the governance perspective.Based on the fiscal perspective,public service charges should meet the basic principles of raising sufficient funds for local governments,so income adequacy,stability and autonomy are the evaluation objects.From an economy perspective,public service charges are efficiently allocated and used based on scarce resources,focusing on two types of efficiency: allocation efficiency and operational efficiency.Allocation efficiency focuses on the balance of supply and demand of public services under the influence of charging prices,and operational efficiency focuses on public services under the influence of charged prices.The input-output ratio,therefore,takes the balance of supply and demand and the cost-effectiveness as the evaluation object;based on the society perspective,public service charges should consider the ability of low-income people to pay and use this as the main evaluation content of equality.Based on the interrelationship between the power and resource views,it is determined that the governance perspective is the prerequisite constraint of the fiscal,economy,and society perspectives,and from this,it is concluded that the purpose of performance evaluation of public service charges is to achieve economy,fiscal and society performance goals under the restriction and guidance of the basic principles of good governance.Under the four perspectives of governance,fiscal,economy and society,based on the commonality of public service charges,design a performance indicator system.(1)From the perspective of governance,choosing legal authorization,fiduciary responsibility,transparency,predictability and public participation as the evaluation objects is based on the five evaluation objects that must be realized in accordance with the principle of good governance.Select the legalization of charging procedures,accountability information,accountability explanations,transparency of charging institutions,transparency of charging accounts,transparency of charging procedures and transparency of charging results,etc.as evaluation indicators;(2)The fiscal perspective selects income adequacy,stability and autonomy as the evaluation objects,Based on this is the principle that local governments must follow to raise sufficient funds for public services.Select necessary costs,non-essential costs,stability of charging content,stability of charging institutions,stability of payment methods,financial autonomy and administrative autonomy,etc.as evaluation indicators;(3)The economy perspective selects the balance of supply and demand and cost-effectiveness as the evaluation objects.Based on the economy perspective,it mainly follows the principle of efficient allocation of scarce resources.Resource allocation and use focus on two types of efficiency: allocation efficiency and operational efficiency,supply and demand balance focuses on allocation efficiency,and cost-effectiveness focuses on operational efficiency.Select total amount,structure,marketization,peak congestion,external cost measurement,and expert scores as evaluation indicators;(4)From a social perspective,equality is selected as the evaluation object,and from the perspective of low-income earners’ ability to pay,political decisions are determined and understand the benefits etc.are used as evaluation indicators.Based on 502 questionnaire survey data,this paper uses the AMOS analysis method to complete the rationality test of the four perspectives of performance evaluation to verify the rationality of the four perspectives of performance evaluation of public service charges and the selection of indicators.The results show that the introduction of governance,fiscal,economy,and society perspectives in the performance evaluation of public service charges is reasonable.The governance perspective has an intermediary effect on the fiscal,economy,and society perspectives,which then verifies what the theoretical part proposes: fiscal,economy and society perspective should be constructed under the constraints of the principle of good governance.Use the Delphi method to complete the importance judgment between the indicators.On this basis,the analytic hierarchy process and the entropy method are used to respectively complete the weight distribution of the evaluation perspective,the evaluation object and the evaluation index(the final comprehensive weight is obtained by the weighted average of the analytic hierarchy process weight and the entropy method weight).Finally,the fuzzy evaluation method is used to quantify the rationality of performance evaluation system of public service charges.The results show that the overall score is between important and quite important,and the evaluation system is reasonable.In this dissertation,under the framework of common evaluation indicators,taking highway charges as an example,this dissertation designs specific and feasible scoring indicators and scoring standards to verify the applicability of the performance evaluation indicators system,and provide reference for the performance evaluation of service charges in other industries.Firstly,based on the governance perspective,fiscal perspective,economy perspective and society perspective,this dissertation selects the highway capacity completion ratio,debt paying ability,service charge income ratio,operating period of toll agencies,actual toll collection rate,published target group complaint rate and other scoring indicators,to complete the construction of individual scoring indicators system of performance evaluation of highway charges,and divide the specific scoring standards Secondly,based on the principle of standardization and typicality,the case of Xingyan Expressway in Beijing is selected.The results show that the performance evaluation score of Beijing Xingyan highway is 65.98,of which the score of economy perspective is relatively good,while the score of governance perspective,fiscal perspective and society perspective is relatively low.Based on the current status of performance evaluation of public service charges and the construction of the evaluation system,this dissertation proposes relevant suggestions for performance evaluation of public service charges from three aspects:(1)Clarify the main responsibility of performance evaluation of public service charging subject.The specific content is: Establish a comprehensive management institution for performance evaluation of public service charges,give play to the active role of the public in performance evaluation,and appropriately introduce third-party evaluation agencies;(2)Improve the performance evaluation indicators system of public service charges.The specific content is: integrating the basic principles of good governance into the performance evaluation system,focusing on considering the pricing of public services,improving service financing and subsidy mechanisms;(3)perfecting the construction of supporting systems for performance evaluation of public service charges.The specific content is: to accelerate the legislative work of the performance evaluation of public service charges,and strengthen the organization and management of the performance evaluation of public service charges.The specific chapters of this dissertation are arranged as follows:The first chapter is the introduction.Starting from the background of free policy of highway on holidays and idle Wu Ying highway,the significance of research on public service charge is clarified.Combing the existing literature,this dissertation clarifies the value judgment standard,perspective selection and measurement method of performance evaluation of public service charge,and expounds the main research content,research ideas,innovation and shortcomings.The second chapter is the status of performance evaluation of public service charges.By combing the status of performance evaluation of public service charges in China,it summarizes the problems existing in performance evaluation of public service charges in China.The results show that the current problems in the performance evaluation of public service charges in China are concentrated in the following three aspects: First,the main object of performance evaluation of public service charges is missing.The main manifestations are as follows:(1)The performance evaluation responsibilities of various government departments are unclear.(2)Public participation in performance evaluation is limited.(3)Lack of third-party performance evaluation.The second is the lack of a performance evaluation indicators system of public service charges.The main manifestations are as follows:(1)Lack of consideration of indicators for the use of public power by government departments.(2)Lack of indicator considerations on the pricing level of public service charges.The third is the lack of legal guarantees and organizational management systems in the performance evaluation of public service charges.The main manifestations are as follows:(1)The performance evaluation of public service charges lacks uniform laws and regulations.(2)The performance evaluation of public service charges lacks unified organization and management.The third chapter is the theoretical basis of performance evaluation of public service charges.Based on the definition of the concepts of public service charges and performance evaluation of public service charges,clarify the problems to be studied in public service charges and the value judgment standards of performance evaluation of public service charges,and clarify the establishment of four perspectives of performance evaluation of public service charges rooted in public service charges "power view" and "resource view".On this basis,it further elaborates the theoretical basis and evaluation content of the four perspectives of performance evaluation of public service charges.The fourth chapter is the indicator selection of performance evaluation system of public service charges.Based on the four perspectives of performance evaluation of public service charges,detailed research is carried out to complete the selection of indicators for performance evaluation of public service charges.Taking into account the differences in the nature of different public services,their performance evaluation indicators are not the same,so this chapter focuses on the selection of common indicators in the performance evaluation of public service charges.The fifth chapter is the rationality test of the performance evaluation system of public service charges.Based on the selection of performance evaluation of public service charges indicators,quantitative analysis methods are used to clarify the weight distribution of evaluation indicators,and then to verify the rationality of performance evaluation system of the public service charges.The sixth chapter is the case application of performance evaluation system of public service charges.Taking the highway charges as an example,this dissertation completes the construction of individual scoring indicators and scoring standard of performance evaluation of public service charges,and completes the case application of Beijing Xingyan highway charges performance evaluation by using performance evaluation system of public service charges,so as to fully test the applicability of the performance evaluation indicators constructed.The seventh chapter is the relevant suggestions on the performance evaluation of public service charges.Based on the current status of performance evaluation of public service charges,the constructed performance evaluation system,and the problems encountered in case application,this article puts forward relevant recommendations for performance evaluation of public service charges from three aspects: evaluation subject,evaluation content,and supporting system construction: clarify public services subject main responsibility of performance evaluation of public service charges,perfecting the performance evaluation of public service charges,and perfecting the supporting system construction of performance evaluation of public service charges.The main innovations of this dissertation:First,the innovation of research perspective.At present,most of the relevant literature adopts a relatively single dimension,with "3E"(economy,efficiency and effectiveness)as the final performance evaluation result,which is equivalent to the concept of financial review and audit performance.In contrast,this dissertation is based on the core issues of public service charges: good public service charges are the issue of reasonable pricing and financing(financing financial funds)for public services that are suitable for charging on the premise of following the basic principles of good governance,and extends the performance evaluation of public service charges from the four perspectives of governance,fiscal,economy and society,and then builds performance evaluation indicators system of public service charges,and use cases.In particular,the performance evaluation of public service charges from the governance perspective is based on the principle of good governance to form statutory authorization,fiduciary responsibility,transparency,foresight,and public participation,etc.to examine the reasonable use of government public power in the process of public service charges,which is different from the traditional single perspective analysis of performance evaluation.Second,innovation in research methods.In this dissertation,the AMOS method is used to study the impact of the evaluation dimension and the evaluation object on the performance target,and the interaction between the evaluation dimension and the evaluation object.The weight of evaluation dimension,evaluation object and evaluation indicators are determined by AHP and the method of the entropy.The rationality of the performance evaluation index system of public service charge is quantified by using the method of fuzziness evaluation.Therefore,through the empirical method,the dissertation analyzes and tests the reasonableness of the construction of the four dimensions of performance evaluation,how the importance of indicators is reflected,and whether it is appropriate to establish the evaluation system in this way,in order to provide a method reference for the relevant research in this field.Third,the innovation of research viewpoints.Based on the view of power and resources,this dissertation determines the four evaluation perspectives of governance,fiscal,economy and society.Different evaluation perspectives are based on different theoretical foundations and principles to be followed to design evaluation objects and evaluation indicators.The governance perspective is based on the public governance theory,following the principles of basic good governance,and determining statutory authorization,fiduciary responsibility,transparency,foresight,and public participation as the evaluation objects;the fiscal perspective is based on the principal-agent theory and following the principle of financial revenue to determine income adequacy,stability and autonomy is the evaluation object;the economy perspective is based on the public pricing theory and the principle of resource efficiency allocation,determining the balance of supply and demand and internalization as the evaluation object;the society perspective is based on the modern development theory,following the principle of equalization of public services,and determining equality as the evaluation object.Finally,specific evaluation indicators are determined according to the evaluation objects.Through the research on the public service charge evaluation system,it aims to provide a theoretical basis and technical reference for public service charge management and reasonable pricing,so as to effectively improve the current performance evaluation of public service charges.Further research is needed in this dissertation:This dissertation is mainly to establish a framework for a common evaluation system based on the common characteristics of public service charges.Although the Beijing Xingyan highway is used as an example to design personality scoring indicators and scoring standards,other public service types have not been involved.Although there are commonalities in the use of public service charging power,service financing and pricing,highway charges are also representative and typical,but different types of public service charges are different,so the design evaluation system should reflect the heterogeneity.Different public service charges face different charging objects and pursuit goals.Government charging personnel of various regions and levels also have certain differences in their understanding and compliance with policies.This requires charging personnel of different industries and departments to share commonalities.Under the guidance of the evaluation system framework,according to the department’s own characteristics,according to the evaluation indicators,design the individual scoring indicators and scoring standards suitable for the department,and appropriately modify the weights to meet the needs of the department and achieve the industry goals.