Abstract: In order to narrow the gap between the rich and the poor, achieve the goal of common prosperity, and promote social equity, it is of great significance to expand public education expenditures and guarantee equality in education. By making use of the data of the Wealth and Income Survey of Chinese Households from 2017 to 2019 from the Innovation and Talent-introducing Base of Income Distribution and Modern Financial Discipline, this paper investigates the effects of public education expenditure on residents’ redistribution preferences. The findings show that the more public education expenditure meets the demand of the residents, the lower their redistribution preference will be, and that the more unfair the income distribution, the stronger their redistribution preference will be. With the increase of the residents’ income, the degree of their redistribution preference will be decreased. As for the groups with different educational background or the groups belonging to different income levels, there exist significant differences in the impact of public education expenditure on the redistribution preferences. For both urban and rural residents, adequate public education expenditure can effectively reduce the redistribution preferences. Insufficient public education expenditure will not only enhance the redistribution preferences, but also lead to the decline of the expected economic status and further raise the redistribution preferences. Therefore, we should increase the investment in public education expenditures, improve the supply level of public education, relieve the class solidification, improve social mobility, increase the residents’ income level, actively play the regulating role of the tax policy and transfer payment policy, so as to promote fair income distribution.

Key words: public education expenditure, economic status expectations, residents' redistribution preferences