Chief Audit Executive as Supervisory Board Member and Executive Compensation Contracts

This paper studies a unique phenomenon in China's corporate governance—that chief audit executives (CAEs) sit on supervisory boards (CAE duality)—and examines its effects on executive compensation contracts. Using a sample of listed firms between 2010 and 2018, we find a significant positive relation between CAE duality and pay-for-performance sensitivity, which suggests that the dual position helps integrate monitoring resources and reduces agency costs. This positive relation is more pronounced when companies face a stricter monitoring environment and in non-state-owned enterprises (non-SOEs) than in SOEs. In addition, we find that the recent reforms on compensation strengthen the role of CAE duality in SOEs. Further analysis identifies the reliability of performance information (i.e., earnings quality) and reduced executive self-interested behaviours (i.e., perquisite consumption) as the influencing mechanisms that increase the demand for performance-based compensation and thus improve pay-for-performance sensitivity.     

众创空间集聚的连续距离测度及影响因素分析

基于253家浙江省众创空间的微观数据，文章在运用连续距离的测度方法测算众创空间集聚水平的基础上，采用零膨胀负二项回归等方法实证分析众创空间集聚的影响机制。研究发现，众创空间的地理分布存在显著的区域差异，主要分布在杭州和宁波市辖区，选址具有明显的集聚特征。回归结果显示，区域创新能力和生态环境均对众创空间的地理集聚具有促进作用，但两者之间存在明显的替代效应；尽管不能直接促进众创空间的集聚，政策引导与创新能力之间具有较显著的互补效应。据此，文章从培育创新能力和优化创新激励等方面提出了政策建议。     

公司为什么放弃债务的收益呢？

经典资本结构理论认为债务具有税盾效应和财务杠杆效应，因此公司会选择适当的负债以获得债务的税收收益。但是，现实中一些公司的负债很低，甚至为零。公司为什么放弃债务的税收收益呢？本文以2007～2011年中国A股上市公司为研究样本，从行为公司金融的视角分析管理者能力是否导致公司采用“低杠杆”策略。结果表明，中国上市公司存在普遍的低杠杆现象，管理者能力的差异是导致公司采用“低杠杆”策略的重要原因。     

金融素养、家庭财富与家庭创业决策

本文利用2015年中国家庭金融调查(CHFS)数据,分析了金融素养、家庭财富与家庭创业决策三者之间的关系。整体上,金融素养的提高显著增加了家庭参与创业的可能性,但家庭参与创业面临着"财富约束效应";而金融素养对家庭财富具有替代作用,提高金融素养有效缓解了家庭的"财富约束效应",促进家庭参与创业。同时,研究发现家庭财富对家庭创业决策的影响并不存在明显的城乡差异,但金融素养更能缓解农村家庭创业所面临的"财富约束效应"。另外,提高金融素养能有效缓解家庭的信贷约束,增加其风险偏好,间接地促进创业。     

Does default point vary with firm size?

This article aims to improve the predictive ability of KMV model by distinguishing firm size. The evidence suggests that default point would vary with firm size. Using the method of particle swarm optimization, we obtain the optimal default point separately for large firms and small firms. Several statistical tests such as the model confidence set methodology show that our relatively tractable model is more likely to have the strongest predictive ability.     

Corporate association strategies and consumer responses: The relative effectiveness of CA versus CSR communication strategy by industry type

Given the importance of communication in the realm of corporate associations, this study analyzes the roles that communication strategies play in the formation of corporate associations. The study examines (1) whether particular types of associations (corporate ability or corporate social responsibility associations) can be developed through CA- or CSR-based communication strategies, and (2) the relative effectiveness of these two association types at amplifying favorable consumer responses across three different industries (consumable goods, durable goods, and stigmatized goods). An experiment was conducted to test the proposed model with six Fortune 500 companies. The results demonstrate that communication strategies can effectively facilitate a particular type of association. Differing levels of association effectiveness were found within each industry. For the consumable goods industry, CA associations are found to be more effective than CSR associations. For the durable goods industry, CSR associations are more influential at enhancing consumer attitudes and purchase intent than CA associations, while CA associations have a larger impact on supportive communication intent. In the case of the stigmatized industry, CSR associations play a determinant role in fostering positive consumer responses. This study provides managers and communication specialists with more concrete guidance for choosing a particular corporate positioning and communication strategy.     

The impact of parental migration on non-cognitive abilities of left behind children in northwestern China

Despite the vast literature surrounding various aspects of left behind children (LBC)’s development in China, very few studies have examined the development of, and impact on their non-cognitive abilities as a result of parental migration. Using survey data consisting of 5002 eighth graders from 160 middle schools in northwestern China, this paper investigates how parental migration affects children’s non-cognitive abilities, as is measured by Big Five components of conscientiousness, extraversion, neuroticism, agreeableness, and openness, as well as children’s grit. We narrow our analysis to long run and short run migration subsamples and use the propensity score matching method to address the potential selection bias issue. Our results show that mother’s migration is particularly harmful to the development of children’s non-cognitive abilities, as mother is usually the primary caregiver and mother’s migration makes less economic contribution to the family. In the long run, LBC with migrant mother tend to have lower levels of conscientiousness and grit; they also have higher level of neuroticism (or lower level of emotional stability). In the short run, when mother migrates, children tend to have lower levels of conscientiousness, agreeableness and openness.     

Cognitive ability and human behavior in experimental ultimatum games

Recent researches have shed light on the effect of cognitive ability on economic decision-making. By measuring cognitive ability applying Raven's progressive matrix test, we obtain two significant results that this effect affects decision-making in two types of experimental ultimatum games. First, the higher the cognitive ability, the larger the amount a sender offers when the offer is smaller than or equal to the half split. Second, the higher the responders’ cognitive ability, the smaller the offer they accept, when they accept it or not with the strategy method. This study not only finds new factors that affect decision-making in experimental ultimatum games, but also provides more evidences that cognitive ability influences economic decision-making.