中国企业绩效视角下拉斐尔曲线微观机制再发现

Rediscovery of the Micro-mechanism of the Laffer Cuver from the Perspective of Chinese Enterprise Performance

减税降费是激发企业活力、推动宏观经济高质量发展的重要举措,尤其在当前疫情情况下,制定保障企业生存、助力企业复工复产的税收政策更需找准发力点。拉斐尔曲线作为西方减税政策的主流理论基础被反复提及引述,然而该曲线的已有研究都是以所得税条件下劳动者的个人劳动供给决策作为其微观机制,这与流转税在我国税制结构中占据主导地位,且劳动力市场是供大于求的基本国情不符。因此,传统拉斐尔曲线在我国的具体环境下是否依然存在,其在企业层面的微观机制又是如何?这正是本文希望讨论的问题。本文采用2003—2017年沪深A股上市公司数据,首先对我国拉斐尔曲线的存在性进行检验,并进一步对企业绩效是否是拉斐尔曲线存在的影响机制进行验证。研究发现:我国存在拉斐尔曲线,且企业绩效是解释拉斐尔曲线的一个重要微观机制;同时,流转税和所得税都存在拉斐尔曲线,但微观机制只在流转税中成立,说明流转税环节的税收优惠相对于所得税应该更有效;并且不同产业和不同避税程度企业的拉斐尔曲线形状亦有显著差异。本文的研究结论为政府后续制定更加精准、高效的减税政策提供了思路方向。

Tax reduction and fee reduction is an important measure to stimulate the vitality of enterprises and promote the high-quality development of macro-economy.Especially in the current epidemic situation,it is more necessary to find the right starting point to formulate tax policies to ensure the survival of enterprises and help enterprises return to work and production.Laffer curve,as the mainstream theoretical basis of western tax reduction policies,has been repeatedly cited.However,the existing research on this curve takes the individual labor supply decision-making of Laborers under the condition of income tax as its micro-mechanism,which is inconsistent with the basic national conditions of our country,where turnover tax is the main tax category in the structure of tax system and the labor market is oversupply.Therefore,whether the traditional Laffer curve still exists in China's specific environment,and what is its micro-mechanism at the enterprise end?This is exactly what this article wants to discuss.In this paper,we will use the real tax rate data of A-share listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen from 2003 to 2017 to test the existence of Laffer curve and the micro mechanism behind it.The results show that:First,there is an enterprise-side Laffer curve in our country.Second,there is an inverted U-type relationship between the actual tax rate of the enterprise and the enterprise performance.At the same time,the enterprise performance has the positive effect on the level of enterprise tax.It can be preliminarily shown that the enterprise performance is the intermediate mechanism of the enterprise's tax rate affecting their level of tax.The further analysis of the intermediary effect shows that the enterprise performance only presents part of the intermediary effect,which implies that the enterprise performance only can be considered as one of the micro-mechanisms explaining the existence of the Laffer curve in the enterprise-side.Which is important is both the turnover tax and the income tax have Laffer curve,but the micro mechanism only holds in the turnover tax.Finally based on the test of the industrial heterogeneity,the slope of the second industrial curve is steeper,indicating that the change of the enterprise tax rate will have a greater impact on the second industrial enterprise.Combined with the policy background of the continuous expansion of tax reduction and fee reduction in China,as well as the current situation of the epidemic situation,it puts forward higher requirements for the accuracy and effectiveness of the government's tax policy implementation.This paper points out that the change of corporate tax rate will change the actual tax burden of enterprises by affecting the performance of enterprises,and the relationship between corporate tax rate and corporate performance is inverted U-shaped.Therefore,in order to enhance the sense of tax reduction,the relevant policies should take improving corporate performance as the foothold,so as to reduce the tax burden of enterprises.At the same time,due to the industrial heterogeneity,the performance of enterprises in the secondary industry is more sensitive to the negative response of high tax burden,so the central government should formulate different levels of tax reduction policies according to different industries,so as to more accurately implement the structural tax reduction policies.The contribution of this paper is,unlike previous study focus on the Laffer curve under the background of western countries with income tax dominating tax system,this study concentrates the China's tax system that is dominated by the turnover tax and finds the Laffer curve exists in China's enterprise level,and enterprise performance is one of micro mechanisms explaining it.However,the limitation of this paper is no further discussion on the internal reason why tax rate changes corporate performance.The next research will be more in-depth research.