新世纪以来,我国的政策话语出现了“关注民生”的明显转向,特别是自党的十八大以来,“增进人民福祉”更是明确成为党和政府全面深化改革的重要目标。在政策实践中,各级政府纷纷公布民生实事或民生工程,加大民生投入,打造民生财政;在学术界,民生研究也开始成为显学,有的探讨如何保障改善民生,有的建构民生指数,也有的在量度“民生财政”。然而,何谓民生投入,或者说何谓民生财政,无论是实务界还是学术界,都没有达成共识。针对这种情况,论文尝试就量度民生财政做些努力。首先分析了三种目前较为流行的,基于狭义、广义和更为宏观的民生概念的量度工具及其局限;其次,从社会政策在我国的发展现状与社会支出的国际经验出发,建议用“社会政策”概念来框定“民生”内涵,并指出推动我国社会支出研究的必要性与可行性;最后,尝试初步构建适合我国国情的社会支出指标体系的框架。论文认为,社会支出反映了一个国家或地区在社会政策领域的投入,能够体现出一国的公共支出结构和公共政策格局,是衡量一个国家或地区在改善社会福利水平方面所作努力的重要指标,因而能够在量度民生财政上体现出更好的政策建议效用与国际对话能力。这对当前正处于职能转变和向服务型政府转型的我国政府部门来说具有重要意义。 Since the eighteenth century, since the 18th CPC National Congress, “promoting the well-being of the people” has clearly become an important goal of the party and the government in deepening the reform in an all-round way . In policy practice, governments at all levels have announced livelihood projects or people’s livelihood projects in an effort to increase people’s livelihood inputs and build people’s livelihood and finance. In the academic world, people’s livelihood research has also started to become significant. Some have discussed how to safeguard people’s livelihood, Others are in the measurement of “livelihood finance.” However, no consensus has been reached on whether people’s livelihood should be invested or what people’s livelihood and financial services are in practice and academia. In response to this situation, the paper attempts to make some efforts to measure people’s livelihood and finance. Firstly, it analyzes three kinds of measuring instruments and their limitations, which are popular at present, based on the concept of people’s livelihood in a narrow sense, in a broad sense and in a broader sense. Secondly, starting from the international experience of social policy in China and social spending, Social policy “to frame the meaning of” people’s livelihood "and point out the necessity and feasibility of promoting social expenditure research in our country. Finally, try to construct the frame of social expenditure index system that suits our national conditions. The dissertation holds that social expenditure reflects the input of a country or region in the field of social policy and can reflect the structure of public expenditure and public policy in a country. It is an important indicator to measure the efforts made by a country or region in improving social welfare. Which can reflect the people’s livelihood finance better policy recommendations utility and international dialogue ability. This is of great significance to our government departments that are currently in the process of transforming their functions and transforming to a service-oriented government.