城市文明、交易成本与企业“第四利润源”——基于全国文明城市与民营上市公司核匹配倍差法的证据

Urban Civilization,Transaction Costs and Firm's Fourth Profit Source——Evidence from the Private Listed Companies and National Civilized Cities Based on KPSM-DID Method

针对降低交易成本能否营造"第四利润源"的命题,本文将文明程度的提高视为交易成本下降的一个改善机制,利用中央文明委开展"创建全国文明城市评选表彰活动"的准自然实验,使用核匹配倍差法克服样本选择偏差与内生性问题,对包含文明城市在内的全国189个城市与518家民营上市公司的面板数据进行了实证检验。结果发现,城市文明程度的提高显著提升了所在地民营上市公司的利润率与净利润率水平,在剔除三大传统利润源所影响的"时间效应"后,"创文"行动产生的"净处理效应"分别达到了6.4493和5.5046个百分点。"创文"后民营上市公司的管理费用占比平均下降了0.2647个百分点,销售费用占比平均下降了0.6285个百分点,财务费用占比平均下降了0.0259个百分点。该研究结果证实了本文的理论推断——城市文明的进步降低了市场交易成本,进而提升了所在地民营上市公司的利润水平,从而为解答有关"第四利润源"的成立性命题提供了直接证据。

In order to clarify whether reducing transaction cost can create the fourth profit source, this article regards the civilization improvement as a mechanism of reducing transaction cost, takes the national civilized city award by central civilization committee as a quasi-natural experiment, and employs KPSM-DID method to overcome sample selection bias and endogenous problem, then empirically testes this proposition by use of the panel data from 189 cities and 518 private listed firms. The results show city civilization enhancement significantly improves the profit rate and net profit ratio of private listed companies. Thus its net treatment effect is respectively 6.4493 and 5.5046 percentage points after excluding the time effect decided by three traditional profit sources. Since creating and be elected as national civilized city, the average ratio of administrative expense in private listed company fell by 0.2647 percentage points, the average ratio of selling expense decreased by 0.6285 percentage points, and the average ratio of financial expense decreased by 0.0259 percentage points. This study result confirms the theoretical inference that advances of city civilization enhance profit level of private listed company through reducing market transaction costs, so it provides a direct evidence to explain the mystery of the fourth profit source.