R&D税收优惠政策促进了企业基础研究了吗?——来自省级面板的实证检验

Are R&D Preferential Policies Conducive to Basic Research of Enterprises?——Empirical Test from Provincial Panel

政府R&D税收激励对企业基础研究的作用还未被证实。基于2009-2016年《中国统计年鉴》和《工业企业科技活动统计年鉴》联合数据筛选出基础研究、R&D税收减免数据,本文运用面板回归方法验证了中国R&D税收激励政策对企业基础研究的激励效应。研究发现,第一,目前中国R&D税收激励政策对企业基础研究存在挤出效应。第二,进一步细分R&D税收优惠政策,结果表明研发加计扣除政策对企业基础研究作用不明显,而高新技术企业15%税率式优惠政策显著挤出了企业基础研究支出;第三,政府R&D税收优惠政策对企业基础研究失灵的原因在于政府"一刀切"的R&D税收减免实施标准,即基础研究和试验发展支出采取统一的减免力度,导致R&D税收激励政策对试验发展支出产生了较高的显著减税效应。该标准会诱导利润最大化的企业开展低质量创新。本文的实证结论揭示了我国R&D税收优惠政策的不足,也从政策视角重新给出了中国企业基础研究投入不足的一个新解释。

The effect of government R&D tax incentives on corporate basic research has not been proven. Based on the joint data of the 2009-2016 "China Statistical Yearbook" and "Industrial Enterprise Statistics Yearbook of Scientific and Technological Activities", basic research data and R&D tax relief data are screened. This paper uses panel regression to verify the incentive effect of China’s R&D tax incentives on basic corporate research. The research found that, first, the current Chinese R&D tax incentive policies have a crowding-out effect on corporate basic research. Second, if we further subdivide the preferential R&D tax policies, the results will show that the R&D super deduction policy has no obvious effect on the basic research of enterprises, while the 15% tax rate preferential policy for high-tech enterprises significantly squeezes out the basic research expenditures of enterprises. Third, the reason for the failure of preferential tax policies on corporate basic research lies in the government’s "one size fits all" R&D tax reduction and exemption standard. In other words, basic research and experimental development expenditures adopt a unified reduction and exemption, resulting in R&D tax incentives that have a relatively high impact on experimental development expenditures. This standard will induce profit-maximizing companies to carry out low-quality innovations. The empirical conclusion of this article reveals the insufficiency of our country’s R&D tax preferential policies, and also provides a new interpretation for the insufficient investment in basic research of Chinese enterprises from a policy perspective.