政府行为的不确定抑制了企业创新吗?——基于地方财政行为波动的视角

Has the Uncertainty of Government Behavior Hindered Firm Innovation?Perspective from the Fluctuation of Local Government Fiscal Behavior

本文研究地方财政行为波动与企业创新的关系,旨在解释中国式分权下的地方政府行为如何影响我国企业的创新活动。以2002—2012年中国A股上市公司为样本,研究发现:地方财政行为的频繁波动破坏了以财税为核心的政企双边关系的稳定性和可预期性,这种不确定性导致企业创新活动的减少,表现为财政行为的波动性越大,创新性投资活动就越少;而且这种负面影响无论在国有还是非国有企业、大规模还是小规模企业中都是显著的,这说明财政波动对不同类型的企业创新都产生了负面影响;而地方政府质量的提高不仅促进了企业的创新活动,而且有助于缓解财政行为波动对企业创新的负向影响。本文提供了地方财政行为影响企业创新活动的微观证据,为地方政府如何培育辖区内企业的创新活动提供了新的视角和政策依据。

China＇s ＂Twelfth Five-Year Plan＂ has clearly pointed out that we should found an innovative country by implementing the innovation-driven development strategy, promoting the reasonable allocation of innovation re- sources and enhancing innovative spirit of enterprises and the whole society. Although China has already improved national innovation policies and firms have realized the importance of innovation, innovation activities haven＇t per- formed as successfully as expected. Since China still run in the process of transition from a planned economy to a market economy, the government plays an important role in finns＇ investment decisions. This paper studies the relationship between the fluctuation of local government fiscal behavior and firm innova- tion, and intends to explain how the local governments under Chinese - style fiscal decentralization influence firm in- novation. Using a sample of A-share listed firms between 2002 and 2012 in China,we provides significant evidence that frequent fluctuations in local fiscal behavior undermines the stability and predictability of the bilateral relation- ship between government and firms, which highly depends on fiscal and taxation. The uncertainty of frequent fluctua- tions of local fiscal behavior hinders firm＇s innovation. The more fluctuation of local government fiscal behavior, there would be less innovative investment activities in firms. In further studies, we find that the negative effect in both the state-owned and non-state-owned enterprises, big or small enterprises are significant, suggesting that local govern- ment financial volatility has a negative effect on different types of firm innovation. Fortunately, to some extent, high quality of local governance not only promotes firm innovation, but also helps to alleviate the negative relationship be- tween fluctuation of local government fiscal behavior and firm innovation. This paper makes some contribution to the literature. Firstly, the paper provides microscopic evidence that local government fiscal behavior affects firms＇ innovation activities in China. Recent studies find that, after removing rea- sonable financial volatility, fiscal behavior volatility is still exists in many countries. The volatility inhibits the growth of output, causes stagflation, and suppresses the upgrading of industrial structure. However, these studies dominate in the macro and industry aspect, lacking of microscopic evidence in this field. It will hamper us to understand the neg- ative impact of financial volatility behavior deeply. So, our research would fill the gap and find how the fluctuation of local government fiscal behavior hinders firm＇s innovation. Secondly, this paper reveals the possible pathways influ- encing corporate behavior from government officials. Although, recent literature of the interaction between govern- ment and enterprises advance to government officials from government, we don＇t know government officials how to af- fect enterprise investment behavior. In this study, we think that financial behavior maybe the possible pathways af- fecting firm innovation from government or government officials. Thirdly, the paper enriches the innovation from the perspective of external environment uncertainty. A lot of papers study how to affect innovation in China, including corporate governance ,financing constraints, management features, but these papers suppose that the external envi- ronment is stable, and the uncertainty of the external environment on the innovation is ignored. It provides us the op- portunity to study the uncertainty of the external environment on the innovation from the perspective of frequent fluc- tuations of fiscal behavior. The implications of this paper are as followed. Firstly, in order to create a favorable investment environment and increase firms＇ innovation activities, government should manage its ＂visible hand＂, constrain financial behavior ran- domness, strengthen financial expectations and reduce the frequent fluctuations of fiscal behavior. Secondly, the au- thority of the State should improve the assessment criteria for promotion incentive system and the tenure system of the officials and ensure continuity and consistency of government policies, which would lead to gradually reduce the frequent fluctuation of fiscal behavior caused by Chinese - style fiscal decentralization and improve the firms＇ inno- vation activities. Thirdly, we provided an indirect evidence for the implementation of the new ＂Budget Law＂, which is expected to be beneficial for the development of the local firms. According to the new law, the budget should be transparent. The theme of the law is to regulate the behavior of the government revenue and expenditure, control the disorderly charges of the govemment and stabilize the business investment environment. The new ＂Budget Law＂ provides policy guarantee for the firms＇ innovation activities.