税收竞争对地区经济韧性的影响与机制研究——来自14城市群183城市的经验证据

The Impact and Mechanisms of Tax Competition on Regional Economic Resilience:Empirical Evidence from 183 Cities in 14 Urban Agglomerations

地方政府降低实际税负的税收竞争可以促进经济增长、要素流入、产业集聚、技术创新以及产业结构升级,进而提高地区经济韧性,但其带来的这一系列问题也可能加剧经济波动,阻碍地区经济韧性提升。以“抵抗力—恢复与适应力—转型力”三维评价指标体系测度城市经济韧性,采用2005-2019年14个城市群183个城市面板数据的分析发现:14个城市群的经济韧性均呈现波动上升的趋势,但东部地区的增长速度明显快于中西部地区,导致城市群之间经济韧性差距趋于扩大;地方政府税收竞争显著促进了本地经济韧性提升,并存在吸引要素流入、促进产业多样化、提高创新能力3条影响路径;税收竞争的经济韧性提升效应随着地区产业结构的升级而增强,并表现出从东到西逐渐减弱的区域异质性,但税收竞争力度过大无益于经济韧性的提升。因此,应理性对待和有效发挥地方政府竞争的激励效应,通过完善绩效考核机制改善政府行为,使地方政府的税收竞争保持在合理的区间内,并积极构建更具韧性的经济和社会系统。

The tax competition mechanism of local government is regarded as an important source of China’s long-term rapid economic growth.However,with the transformation of China’s economic development goal from high-speed growth to“steady progress”,in this context,exploring the mechanism of local government tax competition on economic resilience is conducive to giving play to the important role of“promising government”in promoting sustained regional economic growth and providing policy guarantee for high-quality economic development.Urban agglomeration is the key to the construction and improvement of China’s economic resilience in the future.Based on the panel data of 183 cities in 14 urban agglomerations in China from 2005 to 2019,this paper constructs a three-dimensional index system of“resistance-recovery and adaptability–transformation”and uses the entropy method to measure economic resilience.The panel fixed effect model,intermediary effect model,and threshold model were used to reveal the impact of tax competition on economic resilience.The study found that:(1)the comprehensive index of economic resilience of 14 urban agglomerations showed a trend of fluctuation during the study period,but the growth rate of urban agglomerations in the eastern region was significantly faster than that of urban agglomerations in the central and western regions,and the economic resilience gap between urban agglomerations was widening.(2)Tax competition can promote the improvement of economic resilience by attracting the inflow of factors,promoting the diversified development of industries,and improving the innovation capacity of cities.(3)The high intensity of tax competition is not conducive to the improvement of economic resilience;tax competition can significantly improve economic resilience in eastern and central regions,but not in western regions.(4)The effect of tax competition on economic resilience is enhanced with the improvement of regional industrial structure.Therefore,first of all,local governments should take the promotion of regional economic resilience as a policy focus,rationally treat and effectively play the incentive effect of tax competition,encourage technological innovation,promote the development of emerging industries,and build diversified industrial clusters.Second,under the strategic guidance of“more resilience”,break the“GDP-only”official evaluation system and shift to the long-term goal of sustainable development and strengthening resilience.Finally,it is necessary to further improve the fiscal and tax benefit distribution mechanism,establish a clear and win-win industrial transfer benefit sharing system,expand and strengthen industrial cooperation demonstration zones,and form a coordinated and orderly industrial transfer and upgrading mechanism between regions,so as to promote the overall improvement of regional economic resilience.The above conclusions provide important policy implications for how fiscal and tax policies serve stable macroeconomic growth and promote the formation of regional economic layouts with complementary advantages and high-quality development under the background of the new normal.