In the laughter, Xu Haodong took a high stool, sat down on the side of the podium, breathed a sigh of relief, and began to talk.

"Guys, before I get to the point, I want to share with you a scientific question, is it the chicken or the egg? This classic scientific question has plagued us human beings for hundreds of years. British scientists are said to have solved the mystery by saying that there are chickens and then eggs, on the grounds that they have discovered that a protein that catalyzes the formation of eggshells is only found in the ovaries of chickens. ”

Researchers from the University of Sheffield and the University of Warwick in the United Kingdom published a paper entitled "Structural Control of Eggshell Protein Crystal Nuclei", in which the scientist used a supercomputer to amplify the formation process of eggs and came to the conclusion that a protein called OC-17 is a catalyst that accelerates the growth of eggshells, and without OC-17 protein, the appearance of eggs cannot crystallize into eggshells. This protein converts calcium carbonate into the calcite crystals that make up the eggshell. Calcite crystals are found inside many bones and eggshells, but hens form calcite crystals faster than any species, producing six grams of eggshells every twenty-four hours. ”

Colin Freeman, Ph.D. in the Department of Engineering Materials at the University of Sheffield, said: "Scientists have previously discovered the OC-17 protein and speculated that it is related to egg formation. But after careful research, we finally understood how it controls the egg formation process. Interestingly, various birds appear to have proteins such as OC-17 that catalyze eggshell formation. So Freeman concluded that there was no place to live with the eggshell, yolk and liquid that protects the chicks, and that there could be no eggs without the OC-17 protein in the ovaries of chickens. Therefore, there must be chickens and then eggs. ”

"Guys, why do I say it's a question of chicken or egg? Because the question I'm going to talk about next is very similar to this one, that is, whether there is a bribe taker or a bribe giver first. To be honest, this question has been bothering me for a long time, and I've been trying to figure it out. Some people compare bribe-takers to chickens and bribe-givers to eggs, and according to the theory that there are chickens and then eggs, then there should be bribe-takers first and then bribe-givers. ”

"Corruption is accompanied by the emergence of the state apparatus, and this is because of power, and only with power can there be capriciousness and rent-seeking of power, and willfulness and rent-seeking are the root causes of corruption. Bribery is the most typical and common form of corruption, but if we want to discuss and study bribes and bribe-takers, we cannot fail to talk about bribe-givers and bribe-givers. Therefore, in order to find out whether there was a bribe taker or a bribe giver first, I specifically consulted the old secretary Liu Zhengdao. ”

Liu Zhengdao, the old secretary, said that in the past, there were also corrupt phenomena, such as approving slips, greetings, opening back doors, and even embezzlement and embezzlement of public funds, but there were very few bribes, because everyone was very poor, there was no money, there was no environment for bribe-givers, and there were no bribe-takers. At first glance, it may seem that there are bribe-givers and then bribe-takers, but, but, ah, that's not the case. Liu Zhengdao, the old secretary, said that even in the era of market economy, the government is still strong, because power is always stronger than money, money can corrupt power, but power can destroy money. In other words, the old secretary Liu Zhengdao believes that there are bribe-takers first, and then there are bribers. ”

"Frankly speaking, I agree with the old secretary Liu Zhengdao's statement that there are bribe-takers first, and then there are bribers. From the point of view of economics, there is a discipline called political economy, and why it is called political economy instead of economic politics is very revealing. So I also think that as far as bribe-takers and bribe-givers are concerned, bribe-takers are strong, and bribe-givers are weak, helpless, and forced out. If the bribe-giver is hateful, then the bribe-taker is hateful, and as a person in power, it is the bribe-taker who should be eliminated. ”

At this, the hall burst into applause.

But Xu Haodong looked serious.

"Ladies and gentlemen, your applause is out of place, or at least not rigorous enough. As the saying goes, a slap does not make a sound, just as the chicken and the egg are symbiotic with each other, the liar and the deceived are symbiotic with each other, and the bribe-taker and the bribe-giver are also symbiotic with each other, this is materialist dialectics, it is a truth that has been proven by history, and you cannot oppose it. I am the one in power, I want to reflect, you are entrepreneurs, you also have to reflect, only in this way can society develop and progress. ”

"Now, let me talk about one word, original sin. The term original sin comes from a Christian legend, and it refers to sins that human beings are born with and cannot be washed away. The Bible says: There are two kinds of sin in man, original sin and this sin, original sin is the sinful nature and evil root left over from the sins of the ancestors, and this sin is the sin committed by each person. Looking back at the development history of countries around the world, it is not difficult for us to find that the changes are endless, the original sin is not endless, and the economic, legal and moral controversies that accompany it are also endless. ”

So, how do we recognize the original sin of our country's private entrepreneurs? From the perspective of new institutional economics, China's gradual reform is also a process of inducing institutional changes. According to a professor's analysis, due to the change of the institutional choice set caused by the disequilibrium of the system, and the disequilibrium of the system leads to the opportunity for profit, an individual or a group of people spontaneously advocates, organizes and implements in response to the opportunity to complete the change or replacement of the current institutional arrangement, and this process is the process of induced institutional change. Its dynamics depend on the expected benefits and costs of individual innovators, and there are externalities and free-riders in the formal induced institutional change. ”

"Specific to China's reform, because the planned economic system in the early stage of reform has been unable to meet the needs of the development of productive forces, the government put forward the strategic policy of reform, opening up, and invigorating, and this policy change is equivalent to expanding the choice of the system, which leads to the profit opportunities under the imbalance of the system, and the reform is far away from the center of power, and the risk of innovation is low in the rural areas. In the early days of the reforms, individual innovators had to pay huge costs because they pushed the boundaries of the policies of the time. However, due to the externalities of institutional change and the existence of free riders, the reward for their innovation is less than the social reward as a whole, so this kind of original sin that breaks the bottom line of the policy. Actually, original sin is not necessarily sin, and even if it is, it deserves at least moral salvation. ”

"As reforms have progressed, access has shifted from general commodity markets to factor markets and capital markets, as exemplified by the rise of the property and coal market, as exemplified by the rise of the capitalist tycoon. However, the legal foundation and fair competition environment of a good market economy have not been formed, especially in the context that the factor price system is far from being marketized, coupled with the triple squeeze of administrative privileges, monopoly state-owned enterprises and super-national treatment of foreign capital, our private enterprises have to dance with shackles in the factor market and capital market. As a result, collusion between officials and businessmen, illegal occupation of land, illegal fundraising, loan and contract fraud, and manipulation of securities trading prices are not uncommon. ”

"I personally believe that it is beyond reproach to severely punish this kind of original crime or economic crime that not only violates the rule of law in the market but also harms social fairness and justice, which is not only the need to shape the rule of law in the market, but also the proper meaning of anti-corruption, because behind almost all the fall of the rich, there is a series of official shadows. We cannot confuse the original sin of private entrepreneurs. Under the broad vision of inducing institutional change, the original sin that broke through the limitations of the policy at that time actually had the original merit, and the collective original sin of those private enterprises, state-owned enterprises or foreign enterprises was actually a reflection of the original sin of the system. ”

The hall burst into applause again.