Cannikin Law tells us that the short board is the key factor to determine the capacity of the whole barrel. No matter how long the short board is, it has no practical significance. The same is true of economic development. Shortcomings not only affect the speed of economic growth, but also restrict the quality of economic development. At the moment when "China’s economy has shifted from a high-speed growth stage to a high-quality development stage", in order to effectively improve the quality and efficiency of economic operation, we must make real contributions and see practical results by "complementing the shortcomings".
There are shortcomings in any period of economic development. In the stage of rapid growth, the main shortcomings of China’s economic operation are lack of materials and supply, and serious supply shortages such as transportation, energy and communication have become "bottlenecks". At the stage of high-quality development, the new shortcomings are highlighted. For example, compared with the economic growth rate, quality and efficiency are shortcomings; Compared with the virtual economy, the real economy is a short board; Compared with urban economy, rural economy is a short board; Compared with the economic field, the people’s livelihood field is a short board; From the point of view that the institutional mechanism adapts to the new requirements of economic and social development, the lack of institutional supply is a shortcoming. Therefore, it is an inevitable choice for China’s economy to move towards high-quality development. We must start from the important areas and key links that seriously restrict economic and social development and the outstanding problems that the people urgently need to solve, and make up for both hard and soft shortcomings, both development shortcomings and system shortcomings.
From the analysis, focusing on the high-quality economic development, among many shortcomings, three key shortcomings should be given priority: insufficient scientific and technological innovation, lagging system and unsmooth economic cycle.
Fill in the shortcomings of scientific and technological innovation
From a macro perspective, the key reason for the short quality of economic development is the lack of innovation drive. Innovation is the propeller of high-quality development. Only by constantly innovating and fully applying innovation results to economic activities can product quality be improved, people’s new needs can be continuously met, economic operation efficiency can be improved, and the economy can embark on the track of high-quality development.
我国科技创新不足的短板特别是关键核心技术短板，使我们真切感受到了“卡脖子”的滋味。习近平总书记指出，“关键核心技术是国之重器，对推动我国经济高质量发展、保障国家安全都具有十分重要的意义，必须切实提高我国关键核心技术创新能力，把科技发展主动权牢牢掌握在自己手里，为我国发展提供有力科技保障”。
突破关键核心技术“瓶颈”势在必行，时不我待，但突破并不容易，需要付出艰苦努力，统筹谋划，把加强基础研究和推进教育改革作为重要支点。事实证明，基础研究和教育是制约我国经济高质量发展的两大短板。
一是要补基础研究之“短”。基础研究是自主创新的源头，是科技强国的基石。补齐基础研究短板，就要加大相应的经费投入。资料显示，世界主要创新型国家的基础研究经费占研发经费比例多为15%到20%，与之相比，我国这一比例还有较大差距。鉴于此，应进一步提高基础研究经费投入水平，并引导企业和社会资本更多投向基础研究。同时，补齐基础研究短板，还应提高基础研究人员待遇，吸引更多高端人才，创设宽松学术环境，建立符合基础研究特点和规律的评价机制；加强创新基地建设，优化国家重点实验室布局，完善国家对基础研究的支持体系。
The second is to make up for the "short" of education. High quality development depends on innovation, innovation depends on talents, and the cultivation of innovative talents depends on education. The key to cultivate more innovative talents is to change the educational concept and the examination-oriented education model. The cultivation of innovative talents must be eclectic and teach students with different interests and talents in accordance with their aptitude. Higher education should allocate more resources to frontier disciplines and the cultivation of innovative talents, so that more talents with open thinking can stand out. To fill the shortcomings of education, we need to continue to increase funding and strengthen the efforts to improve the quality of teachers, so that high-quality teachers can cultivate high-quality students. In order to attract more outstanding talents to join the teaching staff, it is essential to improve the status and treatment of teachers. Moreover, the cultivation of innovative talents also needs the help of family education. Good family education is the soil for cultivating students’ exploration spirit, independent thinking ability and habits.
Fill in the shortcomings of the system
To achieve high-quality economic development, we must also fill in the shortcomings of the system. Without a matching system, high-quality development cannot be achieved. To a certain extent, the intensity of system reform determines the progress of high-quality development. The reform of the economic system must be accelerated, deepened in an all-round way, and key breakthroughs must be made to provide strong institutional support for high-quality development. In particular, the reform in the following three key areas must be intensified, accelerated, and take substantial steps.
The first is the reform of the state-owned enterprise system. Whether China’s economy can achieve high-quality development depends to a great extent on whether the state-owned enterprises that play a leading role in the national economy can achieve high-quality development. The Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues of Comprehensively Deepening Reform, adopted by the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee, puts forward that the mixed ownership economy is "an important realization form of the basic economic system". To achieve high-quality development, it is necessary to promote the reform of mixed ownership of state-owned enterprises, expand the reform of mixed ownership in key areas, attract non-state-owned capital to participate in shares, implement employee stock ownership, improve corporate governance structure and enhance the vitality of state-owned enterprises. At the same time, it is necessary to deepen the reform of state-owned assets management system, implement a targeted "streamline administration, delegate power, strengthen regulation and improve services" for state-owned enterprises, and accelerate the transformation from managing enterprises to managing capital, so as to make state-owned enterprises stronger, better and bigger in the market competition.
The second is the reform of the financial system. The importance of financial system reform to achieve high-quality development lies in that both the financial system and the financial system have an important impact on resource allocation and structural adjustment, which is related to the quality of economic development. Where the huge budget funds are invested and used, whether they can avoid inefficient and ineffective investment, realize efficient allocation and promote high-quality development, will inevitably depend on the improvement of the financial system. Therefore, we must deepen the reform of fiscal and taxation system to make it "comprehensive, standardized, open and transparent"; Improve the budget management system and promote the reform of income division between the central and local governments; Improve the transfer payment system, deepen the reform of value-added tax, and establish a standardized and reasonable central and local government debt management and risk early warning mechanism. At the same time, to achieve high-quality development, especially to promote the development of high-tech industries, we must give full play to the role of financial markets, especially capital markets, in resource allocation. One of the problems in China’s financial system is that the proportion of indirect financing is too large, the capital market is underdeveloped, the mechanism is imperfect, and the role of efficient allocation of resources cannot be fully exerted. Another problem existing in the financial system is that a large amount of funds are "divorced from reality", and the financing problems of enterprises, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, have not been solved well for a long time, which has affected the efficiency and benefit of economic operation. The focus of financial system reform is to promote financial market-oriented reform, expand the opening of the financial industry to the outside world, gradually liberalize access restrictions, improve the multi-level capital market system, and increase the proportion of direct financing.
The third is the reform of the income distribution system. The significance of the reform of income distribution system for high-quality development lies in that distribution, as a basic link of social reproduction, plays an important guiding role in resource flow and resource allocation. How to distribute the produced things and whether they are distributed reasonably will not only affect the consumption structure and demand structure, but also affect the investment structure and supply structure. The supply-side structural reform has continuously made new progress, which is inseparable from the cooperation of the reform of the income distribution system. Relieving the pressure of excessive personal income gap, releasing consumption potential and effectively expanding the total social demand are also inseparable from the deepening reform of the income distribution system. At present, the focus of the reform of income distribution system is to accelerate the reform of taxation, wages, social security, transfer payment and other institutional mechanisms.
Fill the short board of economic cycle
The Central Economic Work Conference held in December 2018 proposed that "it is necessary to smooth the national economic cycle and accelerate the construction of a unified, open and competitive modern market system". Emphasis on "unblocking the national economic cycle" aims at "unblocking the cycle". Chinese medicine says, "the general principle is painless, but the pain is unreasonable", and the same is true for economic operation. The "unsmooth" economic cycle not only hinders the flow of factors, but also increases transaction costs, resulting in low efficiency and efficiency of economic operation. The key to smooth the economic cycle is to remove the "obstruction" of the economic cycle, clear up the obstacles of the economic cycle, and make all parts and links of various economic departments interconnected and various factors flow smoothly.
Judging from the actual operation of China’s economy, the "unsmooth circulation" has become a shortcoming that restricts high-quality development. For a long time, local protection, industry monopoly, administrative intervention, access restrictions, ownership discrimination and many other factors have hindered the formation of a unified national market. Various market players cannot compete in a fair market environment, and the market’s function of efficiently allocating resources cannot be fully exerted.
Resources are limited. Whether the limited resources can be allocated to the most needed fields, the most promising industries and the most efficient enterprises, so as to avoid or reduce the mismatch of resources and improve the efficiency of economic operation mainly depends on whether the national economic cycle can be smooth, and whether a unified, open and competitive modern market system can be formed. Only when the market is open and the circulation is smooth can the economy live.
To smooth the national economic cycle and achieve high-quality development, we need to make key breakthroughs in the following aspects.
First, smooth the circulation of real economy and virtual economy. On the one hand, the real economy is the fundamental source of wealth creation and the material basis for the development of virtual economy; On the other hand, the development of real economy can not be separated from the support of virtual economy, especially finance as its basic form, and finance is the blood of real economy. The problem now is that the structure of the real economy and the virtual economy is unbalanced, the circulation is not smooth, the virtual economy is excessively prosperous, and a large amount of funds are "divorced from reality", which has seriously affected the development of the real economy. To fill the shortcomings of the real economy, we must follow the requirements of the report of the 19 th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. "We must focus on the real economy and improve the quality of the supply system as the main direction." Accordingly, finance must improve its ability to serve the real economy and promote the benign interaction between the real economy and the virtual economy. To smooth the circulation of real economy and virtual economy, we should give full play to the function of capital market and increase the proportion of direct financing; Further reduce taxes and fees, reduce the burden on enterprises, and increase financial support for small and medium-sized enterprises and innovation and entrepreneurship; Strengthen financial supervision to curb the "self-circulation" of funds in the financial system. It is necessary to take multiple measures to promote the concentration of resources in the real economy.
The second is to smooth the economic cycle between urban and rural areas. The urban-rural economic cycle is not smooth, which is a major problem that must be solved when China’s economy embarks on the track of high-quality development. The gap between urban and rural areas caused by the dual structure of urban and rural areas makes more resources flow from rural areas with low income to cities with high income, while urban resources rarely flow to rural areas, which intensifies the contradiction between urban and rural areas and makes it difficult for urban and rural economies to integrate and develop. To solve the problem of unsmooth urban-rural economic circulation and fill the shortcomings of rural development, we must not only use the "hand of the government" to invest more public resources in rural areas, but also use the "hand of the market" to guide the factors of production to gather in rural areas, so as to realize the efficient allocation of rural resources, promote the high-quality development of rural economy and make up for the shortcomings of long-term lagging rural economic development. Therefore, we must break down the institutional obstacles that affect the development of urban-rural integration, among which the most crucial thing is to deepen the reform of rural land system, truly attract more elements such as capital, talents, science and technology to flow to the countryside, leave the rural funds and labor force that may flow out in rural areas to combine with the land, enhance the value of rural land through the play of the market, realize the efficient allocation of resources, and provide sustained endogenous power for rural revitalization.
三是畅通公有制经济和非公有制经济循环。在我国基本经济制度下，各种所有制经济享有依法平等使用生产要素、公开公平公正参与市场竞争、同等受到法律保护的权利。党的十八届三中全会通过的《中共中央关于全面深化改革若干重大问题的决定》提出，要“废除对非公有制经济各种形式的不合理规定，消除各种隐性壁垒”；党的十八届五中全会强调要“鼓励民营企业依法进入更多领域，引入非国有资本参与国有企业改革”。但在现实中，公有制经济和非公有制经济之间依然存在着“隐性壁垒”，不少行业存在着民营企业不可逾越的“隔离墙”，有的领域则直接对民间投资“屏蔽”。公有制经济和非公有制经济循环不畅通，意味着资源难以实现更大范围的配置，资源配置的市场化程度降低，必然导致效率损失。2018年11月1日，习近平总书记在民营企业座谈会上指出，“公有制经济、非公有制经济应该相辅相成、相得益彰，而不是相互排斥、相互抵消”“要鼓励民营企业参与国有企业改革”。显然，只有把这些要求落到实处，破除公有制经济和非公有制经济之间的各种障碍，国民经济循环才能真正畅通。
总之，要实现高质量发展，必须加紧补齐关键短板，突破瓶颈制约，疏“堵点”、通“经络”，使国民经济焕发新活力。 （本文来源：经济日报 作者：中央党校（国家行政学院）习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想研究中心 执笔：赵长茂）