赋能还是负能:ESG表现与企业劳动投资效率

Empowerment or Negative Energy:ESG Performance and Labor Investment Efficiency of Enterprises

随着绿色可持续发展理念深入人心,ESG逐渐成为企业管理决策的核心要素,对供给侧结构性改革与劳动力市场健康有序发展产生了深远影响,其能否有效提升劳动投资效率值得深入研究。本文以2011—2021年A股上市公司为研究对象,实证考察了ESG表现对企业劳动投资效率的影响,究竟是“赋能”还是“负能”。研究发现,ESG表现有助于提升企业劳动投资效率,并主要通过缓解融资约束和增强员工创新两条机制予以实现。异质性分析显示,对于非国有企业、审计质量较低、非高新技术企业以及市场竞争地位较低的企业,ESG表现凸显出积极的治理效应,对劳动投资效率的提升效果更为明显。进一步分析发现,ESG表现能够显著抑制劳动投资过度及投资不足,且主要体现为缓解雇佣过度、雇佣不足与解雇过度。本文研究结论对深入推进企业ESG责任履行、优化劳动力资源配置和促进经济高质量发展具有重要意义与政策启示。

With the concept of green and sustainable development gaining popularity,ESG has been gradually becoming a core element of corporate decisions.It has a profound impact on the structural reform of the supply side and the healthy and orderly development of the labor market,and whether it can effectively improve labor investment efficiency deserves in-depth study.Taking A-share listed companies from 2011 to 2021 as the research sample,this paper empirically examines whether the impact of ESG performance on labor investment efficiency is“empowerment”or“negative energy”.The study finds that ESG performance is helpful to improve the labor investment efficiency of enterprises,which is mainly achieved through the two mechanisms of alleviating financing constraints and enhancing corporate employee innovation.Heterogeneity analysis shows that ESG performance has a more significant promoting effect on the labor investment efficiency of non-state-owned enterprises,lower audit-quality enterprises,non-high-tech enterprises,and enterprises with a lower competitive market position,showing a positive governance effect.Further analysis finds that ESG performance can significantly inhibit labor overinvestment and underinvestment,which is mainly reflected in alleviating overemployment,underemployment,and over-layoff.The findings of this paper have important policy implications for further promoting the fulfillment of corporate ESG responsibilities,optimizing labor resource allocation,and promoting high-quality economic development.