Rural Health Resource Allocation

Before the system transformed, although the financial capacity of Chinese government was poorer and the public finance expenditure on the health care was fewer, the rural health care had made a great progress depended on the collective economy's support and the health strategic policy that tended to the rural countryside. However, with the system transformed and the tax-sharing reformed, rural health resource allocation started the process of marketing competition,and the township hospitals and the urban hospitals equally together went into a path that the rural depended on itself to operate and get the extra income. Because market allocates rural health resources can't get rid of the disadvantages of" market failure" due to its public goods nature, so the rural health resource allocation fell into the plight that local governments were lack of funds, and the total financial investment was not enough and the fiscal investment structural imbalance, the old equipments fell behind others and the level of the technology was low, service and efficiency quality was reduced, deteriorating the health condition of the rural residents, so the rural patients flew into urban hospitals to look for better health services, as a result,the rural health career operated stagnantly led to its inadequate fund.At the basic of collecting a large amounts of data and material, this article analyzes rural health resource allocation condition since the tax-sharing system reform of China in 1994,which is the total investment of government is inadequate and the fiscal investing structural is imbalance, arriving at a conclusion that the total quantity of investment was inadequate and the investing structural imbalance led to the rural health care low and the numberamount of the government's investment indirectly determined the residents can get the access to health services and the residents'health condition,then from the perspective of public finance and the theory of public goods to require the government to develop the functions of public finance--- to configure and give a supply on the rural health resource that support the rural basic and public health services, to increase financial investment in rural health in order to make the equalization of basic public services in the rural and the urban come ture, and the writer makes this conclusion as the innovation point of this paper. Then, the article studied the problems of the financial investment on the rural health resource from three sides as like the total amount of financial investment, the investing equity and the service quality of the financial investment results, which is based on the perspective of public finance and the public goods theory. Get the main reasons is that the Government did not clearly understand the properties of rural health service, over-reliance on the market, the financial investment pursuit the political goals, tax-sharing system reform leaving the contradictions and the absence of public financial functions. Finally, the paper put forward four countermeasures and suggestions for rural health resources allocation that support the rural basic and public health services, which based on the functions of public finance theory and the theory of public goods. First of all, Chinese government should know clearly the goals of health care reform to play the functions of public finance; Secondly, the government must clearly divide the responsibilities of the supply between government at all levels based on the properties of public goods. Thirdly, strengthen the central government's financial transfer payments to rural public health care; Finally, to increase the total investment, adjust the investing structure to achieve the equalization of public health services. In a word, form a "government-market-individual" Trinity's responsibility system and a "the central government-provincial and municipal governments-county government" trinity's financial input mechanism. Encourage all parties to work together to improve rural health resource allocating efficiency and service quality, to achieve the goal that the equalization of urban and rural basic health services.