国家审计能降低国有企业审计风险吗?——来自省以下审计机关人财物管理改革的准自然实验

Can National Audit Reduce the Audit Risk of State-owned Enterprises?A Quasi-natural Experiment from the Reform of the Human,Financial and Material Management of Audit Institutions below the Provincial Level

以2007—2019年省以下地方国有企业为研究样本,通过构建双重差分(DID)模型,实证检验了2015年开始的省以下地方审计机关人财物管理改革对地方国有企业审计风险的影响。研究结果表明:人财物统一管理显著降低了省以下地方国有企业的审计风险;在经济发展水平高、财政压力小的地区以及投资者监督弱的企业中,人财物管理改革对地方国有企业审计风险的降低作用更加显著;人财物管理改革可以通过提高国家审计质量和降低地方国有企业的代理成本进一步降低审计风险。研究结论对完善我国审计管理体制、加强审计监督具有重要意义。

Using sub-provincial local state-owned enterprises(SOEs)from 2007 to 2019 as the research sample,the impact of the reform of the management of personnel and financial resources of sub-provincial local audit institutions on the audit risk of local SOEs,which started in 2015,was empirically examined by constructing a double difference(DID)model.The findings show that this kind of reform has reduced the audit risks of local SOEs due to the increased independence and authority of local audit bodies.The reform is more thorough in regions with high levels of economic development and low financial pressure and in enterprises with weak investor oversight,and thus having a more significant effect on the reduction of audit risk of local SOEs;furthermore,the reform of the management of human and financial resources mainly further reduces the audit risk of local SOEs by improving the quality of national state audits and reducing their agency costs.The findings have important implications for improving China s audit management system and strengthening the audit supervision system.