市场是配置资源最有效的方式和手段，但是市场决不是万能的，它也有缺陷，主要表现在：(1)市场机制在运行中不可避免地会出现程度不同的经济波动, 在经济总量严重时，一般要经过危机才能恢复平衡，从而导致生产力破坏和社会资源的巨大浪费;(2) 市场竞争的结果可能导致垄断,使资源配置效率下降，损害消费者和其他生产者利益；（3）市场运作虽然是有效的，但市场竞争的结果，如果不加调节，将会导致分配不公，以至两极分化；（4）市场本身对于环境、资源和消费者利益等问题也难以有效地解决；对于涉及国家全局的、长远的利益举措，市场也往往是逆向的。

　　为了弥补市场机制的这些重大缺陷，包括宏观调控在内的政府干预，是现代市场经济所必需的。尤其在我国现阶段，由于市场机制不健全，市场的缺陷有可能人为地扩大；在经济增长时期和体制转换时期，又容易发生结构失衡和经济动荡，这是市场本身难以防范和克服的；对于地区之间的发展不平衡和个人之间的收入分配悬殊等问题，市场也无能为力。所有这些，都要求政府积极地加以干预。宏观调控的主要任务，是保持经济总量平衡，抑制通货膨胀，促进重大经济结构优化，实现经济稳定增长。在经济体制转轨时期, 宏观调控还要为促进市场发育和完善市场机制创造有利条件。 我国宏观调控手段，除了一般市场经济国家都有的财政政策和货币政策两个常规手段之外，还必须运用计划手段。

作为宏观调控手段的计划有两个层次；第一是国民经济与社会发展的总体规划。第二是对国民经济运行中某些重要经济活动进行调节的计划。计划和财政、货币手段并列为经常性的宏观政策工具。当然, 这里的计划不同于计划经济中的计划，它应当以市场为基础,运用市场机制作用，对国民经济和社会发展进行总体规划和综合协调，提出宏观调控目标，并据此引导、调控市场。

Although the market is the most effective mode and means for the allocation of recourses, it is by no means omnipotent. It has its inherent flaws, which are primarily expressed in following aspects: (1) In the process of its operation, the market mechanism will ineluctably suffer from economic fluctuations in varying degrees. When the gross economic volume reaches a critical point, it can generally recover its balance only after a period of crisis, which will result in the devastation of productive forces and in the immense waste of social resources. (2) One probable consequence ensuing from market competition is monopoly, which will reduce the efficiency of resource allocation and produce a detrimental effect on the interests of consumers and other producers. (3) For all the efficiency of market operation, the consequence of market competition, if not regulated, will result in the inequality of distribution and even in rich-poor polarization. (4) The market itself is ineffectual in addressing such issues as the environment, resources, and the interests of consumers. In addition, the market frequently runs counter to those measures that involve the overall and long-range national interests.

In order to compensate for the major defects inherent in the market mechanism, governmental interventions, including macro-manipulation, become indispensable to modern market economy. In particular, at the present stage of China, the deficiencies of the market are likely to be artificially aggravated for lack of a well-developed market mechanism. During periods of economic growth and institutional restructuring, structural imbalance and economic upheavals are liable to occur, which will prove difficult for the market itself to guard against and to surmount. Furthermore, the market remains powerless in dealing with problems such as unbalanced regional development and discrepant individual income and distribution. All those issues call for positive interventions by the government. The macro-manipulation has as its primary objectives the maintenance of a balanced gross economic volume, the containment of inflation, the promotion of major optimizations in the economic structure, and the realization of smooth economic growth. In the course of economic reshuffling, macro-manipulation should also endeavor to create advantageous conditions for facilitating the market development and ameliorating the market mechanism.

For macro-manipulative measures, China, apart from the two conventional approaches of fiscal policy and monetary policy typically employed by countries implementing market economy, must also have recourse to the means of planning. As one of the macro-manipulative measures, planning can be understood on two levels, first, as comprehensive blueprinting of national economy and social development; second, as regulation imposed upon certain important economic activities in the operation of national economy. Planning parallels fiscal and monetary means as a regular instrument of macro-economic policy. Of course, the planning as is referred to here differs fundamentally from the so-called planning under the planned economy. It should be based upon the market. By taking advantage of the role played by the market mechanism, it should conduct all-round designing and comprehensive coordination with respect to national economy and social development and propose macro-manipulative objectives with which to guide and regulate the market.