政府补贴是救命还是续命——对僵尸企业的成因分析

Government subsidy saves life or continues life:an analysis of causes of zombie firms

数量众多、效率低下的僵尸企业严重影响了中国经济的活力和健康发展,但僵尸企业的形成原因却有待厘清。僵尸企业长期亏损却仍能维持生存,外在补贴可能是重要原因(外在补贴可能起到了"续命"作用)。本文利用1999—2007年企业微观层面数据进行研究,发现补贴显著促进了僵尸企业的形成;良好的地区治理环境能够有效抑制补贴的这一不利影响。进一步运用倾向得分匹配方法处理内生性问题,发现由于补贴不当导致僵尸企业的比重升高了3.43%,这是僵尸企业形成中最为重要的因素。从补贴的动态效果可知,补贴不仅是僵尸企业形成的重要原因,并且是僵尸企业僵而不死的重要支撑。本文为客观评估政府补贴对僵尸企业的影响提供了微观层面的经验证据,同时也为进一步加快淘汰僵尸企业提供了有益的政策启示。

Numerous and inefficient zombie firms have severely impacted China＇ s economic vitality and healthy de- velopment, but the reasons of formation of zombie firms remains to be discussed. Subsidies may be the important reasons for the long term loss persistence of firms （ Subsidies may have the effect of continuing life）. This paper u- sing firms micro level data during 1999--2007 finds： Subsidies are the important reason for the formation of zombie firms; Improvement of local governance environment can weaken subsidies negative effects obviously; We use the propensity score matching method to deal with the endogenous problems, and find the proportion of zombie firms in- creased by 3.43 % as the result of improper subsidies ; Paticularly, this paper also examines the dynamic effects of subsidies. Subsidy is also an important reason for the persistence of zombie firms. This study provides a micro-level empirical evidence for assessing the effect of government subsidies on zombie firms, and offers beneficial policy im- plications for further acceleration of the elimination of zombie firms at the same time.