劳动力成本、就业保护与企业技术创新

Labour Cost, Employment Protection and Firm Technological Innovation

文章以2001~2014年沪深A股制造业上市公司为样本,实证考察劳动力成本与企业技术创新的关系及就业保护的调节效应。研究结果表明,劳动力成本的上升能够促进企业的技术创新,而且就业保护的加强会进一步强化这一正向作用。上述结论在考虑了内生性之后依然成立。拓展性检验的结果显示,劳动密集度会弱化劳动力成本与企业技术创新的正向关系,也会减弱就业保护对劳动力成本与企业技术创新关系的强化作用。文章认为,企业必须正视当前劳动力市场结构变化和就业保护制度不断推进的影响,逐步转变发展思维和经营理念;政府应加强对企业转型发展的政策引导,同时要落实就业保护政策,通过压力机制驱动企业技术创新;另外,政府还应认识到相关政策对异质性企业将产生不同的影响,从而增强政策制定和执行的针对性,并通过市场机制推进供给侧结构性改革目标的实现。

This paper examines the relationship between labour cost and firm' technological innovation, and the moderating effect of employment protection by using data of public manufacturing listed companies of Shanghai and Shenzhen A shares during the period 2001-2014. The results indicate that the rising of labour cost can promote firms technological innovation, and employment protection can strengthen such positive relationship. These results keep in analysis after taking into account the endogenous problem. Further test shows that both the relation between labour cost and firm technological innovation and the relation between employment protection and firm technological innovation are less obviously in the firms with higher labour intensity. This paper argues that enterprises should take into consideration the current influences from labour market structure change and advancing of employment protection system, and modify the development and business concepts. The government should strengthen the policy guidance for the development of firms and implement the employment protection policy in order to form the pressure mechanism for enterprise technological innovation. In addition, the government should also recognize that the policy will have different impact on firms because of firm heterogeneity.