Labor regulators said the average salary of monopolized sectors is 7.52 times that of the lowest level of normal industries and the gap is widening, stoking the public fire against monopolies.

Monopolized sectors, such as power, aviation and energy, have been frequent targets of public criticism. Meanwhile, the country's anti-monopoly law has been in the works for a decade.

The hard labor of the law seems difficult to understand, given that monopolies have seriously affected the efficiency of the Chinese economy.

As economists point out, a monopoly creates barriers to market entry, discourages competition, raises prices, and damages the interest of consumers and the economy as a whole. The ensuing exorbitant profits also lead to the much-higher salaries of industrial employees, contributing to social inequality.

We have pinned hope on an anti-monopoly legislation to change the scenario. It would be unintelligent, of course, to depend on a single law to make a fundamental change, but such a law can at least serve as a ram for pushing the opening up of the privileged sectors.

Currently, the focus has been on the stipulation against administrative, or government-created, monopolies. It is rumored that the whole section on administrative monopolies proposed in the draft law will be cut, with only natural and market-based monopolies being tackled in the new legislation.

Admittedly, the legislation involves multiple interests. The proposed cut of the administrative monopoly section may just cater to the privileged sectors under the umbrella of various departmental interests.

It reflects the complicated situation in which various interests interact as China changes from a planned economy to a market-oriented one. Such a proposal, if it becomes reality, may smooth the legislation process and facilitate its enforcement, as it irons out crucial differences.

But it will cause the law miss its target, as government-created monopolies are the major ailments of China's fledgling market economy borne out of a planned economy featuring widespread and in-depth government intervention in economic affairs. There is yet an explicit demarcation between administrative forces and the market.

Such an anti-monopoly situation in China is fundamentally different from that in Western economies, where market-based or natural monopolies are the major target of legislation.

Brewing the cut of the crucial administrative monopoly section of the law, legislators may be unwilling to drag out the legislation process. But the step would be dangerous -- a law that misses the target is no better than no law.

(China Daily May 16, 2006)