要素成本与劳动收入份额:来自最低工资与进口关税的证据

Factor Cost and Labor Income Share:Evidence from Minimum Wage and Import Tariff

本文通过构建理论模型刻画了劳动力成本和贸易成本影响劳动收入份额的经济逻辑,并使用中国工业企业数据,从最低工资和进口中间品关税变化的双重视角检验了要素成本对企业劳动收入份额的影响。研究发现,最低工资标准的上涨和中间品关税的下降均降低了企业劳动收入份额,且这一结论在缓解要素成本的内生性后依然成立。如果消除两种要素成本的变动,企业劳动收入份额将提高0.98个百分点,相对提高幅度达30.6%。对总量劳动收入份额变动的分解发现,企业间要素资源再配置效应的下降是要素成本降低劳动收入份额的重要渠道。本文的研究结论对于积极推进要素市场化改革、促进经济发展方式转变具有重要的政策借鉴意义。

This paper first presents a theoretical model characterizing how labor cost and trade liberalization affect labor income share.We then use Chinese Manufacturing Firms dataset to empirically test the theoretical prediction of our model from the dual perspectives of minimum wage and intermediate tariff changes.Both theoretical and empirical results show that an increase of minimum wage,or a decrease of intermediate tariffs significantly reduce the labor income share.These relationships are robust after correcting for the endogeneity of input costs.We then show that if the costs of minimum wage and intermediate tariff were unchanged,labor income share might increase by 0.98 ppts,a relative increase as large as 30.6%.Furthermore,we decompose the total labor income share and identify that the reduction in the effect of the reallocation of factor resources between enterprises is an important channel for factor costs to reduce the labor income share.Our findings provide meaningful policy implication on promoting national welfare through facilitating the reform of factor marketization and transformation of the economic development mode.