The effectiveness of tax incentives in attracting investment: panel data evidence from the CFA Franc zone

In this paper we investigate to what extent tax incentives are effective in attracting investment in Sub-Saharan Africa. We test the neo-classical investment theory prediction that tax incentives, by lowering the user cost of capital, raise investment. Next to tax incentives, we also estimate the impact on investment of other investment climate variables that are under direct control of the government, such as the transparency and complexity of the tax system, and the legal protection of foreign investors. In developing countries these variables might be as important as or even more important than the tax variables themselves.     

经开区招商引资政策对企业投资的影响

国家级经济开发区政府招商引资,往往需要从产业集聚、税收优惠、政府职能和宏观税负等几个不同的方面,分别对企业投资带来的影响进行必要的考察,企业投资决策也往往受到地方政府各种优惠政策等几个层面的影响。目前学界研究对政府招商引资与企业投资决策考虑因素较为单一,缺乏深度解析,本文就此提出相关构想,引导未来招商引资研究向深层领域拓展。     

Empirical evidence on the effects of tax incentives

This paper considers two empirical questions about tax incentives: (i)?are incentives used as tools of tax competition and (ii)?how effective are incentives in attracting investment? To answer these, we prepared a new dataset of tax incentives in over 40 Latin American, Caribbean and African countries for the period 1985–2004. Using spatial econometrics techniques for panel data to answer the first question, we find evidence for strategic interaction in tax holidays, in addition to the well-known competition over the corporate income tax (CIT) rate. We find no robust evidence, however, for competition over investment allowances and tax credits. Using dynamic panel data econometrics to answer the second question, we find evidence that lower CIT rates and longer tax holidays are effective in attracting FDI in Latin America and the Caribbean but not in Africa. None of the tax incentives is effective in boosting gross private fixed capital formation.     

税费替代:增值税减税、非税收入征管与企业投资

通过减税促进企业投资和提振宏观经济是近年来中国税收制度改革的重要目标,但减税政策的实际效果却存在争议。本文利用2009年增值税转型改革,研究了减税对地方政府税费收入和企业非税负担的影响,从税费替代的角度揭示非税负担变动如何影响企业固定资产投资。研究发现:(1)增值税转型在减税的同时提高了地方政府非税收入并加重了企业非税负担,地方财政收入受增值税转型冲击越大,企业非税负担上升越明显。(2)上述应主要体现在小型、微型和民营企业上,大中型、非民营企业的非税负担未发生明显变化。(3)非税负担上升会显著抑制小型、微型和民营企业的固定资产投资,促使小型微型和民营企业通过持有更多现金和减少流动性负债来应对税费负担不确定性。本文有助于理解减税政策对小型微型和民营企业非税负担的溢出效应及其影响,为通过减税降费促进投资和提振经济提供经验支撑。     

政府财政激励、税收征管动机与企业盈余管理——以财政"省直管县"改革为自然实验的研究

政府对企业利润享有征税权,事实上是几乎所有企业的最大的中小股东,因此有动机对企业进行严格的税收征管,进而影响公司治理。本文以1998-2006年中国工业企业为样本,以财政“省直管县”改革为自然实验,从企业盈余管理的角度对此进行了考察。研究发现:财政“省直管县”改革能够显著抑制县辖区内企业的盈余管理行为,并且仅对具有征管权限的企业发挥作用;同时,当县级政府财政状况较差和税基较大时,财政“省直管县”对辖区内企业盈余管理行为的抑制作用更强,表明财政“省直管县”改革能够激励县级政府加强税收征管,进而改善辖区内企业盈余质量。更进一步地,本文还发现财政“省直管县”改革能够抑制企业逃税,提升县级政府财政收入。本文的研究不仅丰富了政府行为影响公司治理方面的文献,同时也为财政“省直管县”如何缓解县级政府财政困难提供了微观证据。     

R&D tax incentives: a reappraisal

This paper examines R&D tax incentives in oligopolistic markets. We characterize the conditions under which tax incentives reach the socially desirable level of firm-financed R&D spending. The outcome of the market depends not only on the level of technological spillover in the industry but also on the degree of strategic interaction between the firms. One major result emerges from the model: The socially desirable level of R&D investment is not necessarily reached by subsidizing R&D. When the technological spillover is sufficiently low, the government might want to tax R&D investments, and this result does not necessarily arise because firms are overinvesting in R&D. There are also cases in which an R&D tax is desirable even though firms are underinvesting in R&D compared with the first-best optimum. In practice, this theoretical finding calls for a lower sales tax combined with an R&D subsidy in oligopolistic industries with high technological spillovers, and a lower sales tax combined with an R&D tax in oligopolistic industries with low technological spillovers.     

理性预期与能源投资——基于中国碳减排承诺的自然实验

引入宏观经济学的理性预期分析框架来评估未来碳减排承诺如何影响当期的能源投资行为具有重要意义。能源项目投资规模大、持续时间长、不可逆性强,使得投资者在决策时会尽可能地纳入影响未来收益和成本的信息。本文将中国碳排放权交易市场试点政策与发电行业投资行为相结合,理论分析和实证检验了政府规划和实施的碳排放权交易市场试点政策如何影响企业的理性预期作用于当期发电技术项目投资,结果表明,碳排放权交易市场试点政策在规划期会促使企业相对提高试点地区低排放发电技术项目投资,特别是相对提高了这些地区低排放火力发电技术项目投资。碳排放权交易试点政策正式实施之后,企业降低了政策试点地区的高排放发电技术项目投资的实际利用水平。这一发现说明环境管制政策在正式实施之前的规划期,会对企业的投资行为产生预期管理效应,通过释放减排政策信号,促使企业先验地调整能源投资决策,以适应未来减排承诺目标。     

Causes,benefits, and risks of business tax incentives

This paper provides an updated overview of tax incentives for business investment. It argues that tax competition is likely to be a major force driving countries’ tax reforms, and discusses tax incentives as a possible response to this. This is complemented by more detailed arguments for and against tax incentives, and by an illustrative analysis of different incentives using effective tax rates. Findings from the empirical literature on tax incentives are also presented. Based on the overview of theoretical and empirical findings, the paper then suggests a matrix of criteria to determine the usefulness of different tax incentives depending on a country’s circumstances.     

地方竞争是否阻碍了地方政府债务绩效的提升？——理论框架及空间计量研究

本文从举债行为策略视角考察地方竞争对地方政府债务绩效的影响。 首先,从不同地区间举债行为策略互动的视角对地方竞争如何影响地方政府债务绩效进行理论诠释,其次,在采用Global超效率DEA方法测度地方政府债务绩效的基础上,突破空间独立性假设,运用空间杜宾模型对地方竞争影响地方政府债务绩效的效果及空间外溢性进行实证检验。研究发现,在地方效用最大化目标导向下,无论是地方税收竞争还是公共投资竞争,都对债务增速产生了较为显著的正向影响和空间外溢效应,导致地方采取主动扩大债务规模的举债行为策略。与此同时,随着债务规模的持续增长,无论是地方税收竞争还是公共投资竞争,都将对债务绩效产生“规模报酬递减”的负向影响和空间外溢效应,尤其是公共投资竞争的影响效果更加明显。进一步地,如果考虑到可能存在预算软约束现象,地方竞争还将与预算软约束行为相结合,对债务绩效产生了“使用效率递减”的负向影响。本文结论为通过债务合理使用来促进经济高质量发展,防范化解地方政府债务风险提供了政策启示。     

地方政府竞争与对策——基于Justmon-Thisse模型及其扩展的分析

政府竞争是政府运用税收、补贴、基础设施等手段吸引可流动的人力、投资等资源,目的在于促进本地经济的增长,迎合本地居民需要。但是在晋升博弈背景下的政府竞争则由于由官员的收益代替了居民的收益作为地区收益的代表,因此出现了地区基础设施同质化和以高额补助方式进行恶性竞争的招商引资大战。通过对贾斯特曼－蒂斯模型的拓展,我们论证了进行政治体制改革是解决我国政府间恶性竞争的关键,成立具有约束力的区域协调机构或区域合并能够提高本区域的收益水平,通过促进人口自由流动等方式建立“用脚投票”机制,可以作为对政治体制改革滞后的一种有益弥补。     

分税与地方财政支出结构

本文研究了税收分成对地方财政支出结构的影响。理论分析发现,在地方政府的财政支出结构竞争中,税收分成比例的提高将直接导致地方政府增加生产性公共支出,发挥生产性支出的产出外部性,提高产出水平和自身税收收入水平,实现福利最大化。一系列经验分析显著地验证了上述结论,即当地级市政府的税收分成率提高10%,该地区生产性支出占比将提高1.39%。本文的分析和结论有助于解释中国地方财政支出结构变动的原因,从而为政府间税收分配改革提供有效的政策建议。     

Pareto-improving bequest taxation

Altruistic parents may transfer resources to their offspring by providing education, and by leaving bequests. We show that in the presence of wage taxation, a small bequest tax may improve efficiency in an overlapping-generations framework with only intended bequests, by enhancing incentives of parents to invest in their children’s education. We also calculate an optimal mix of wage and bequest taxes with alternative parameter combinations. In all cases, the optimal wage tax rate is clearly higher than the optimal bequest tax rate, but the latter is generally positive when the required government revenue in the economy is sufficiently high. If educational investment is partly unobservable for the government, these results qualitatively hold also when allowing for education subsidies.     

The impact of tax incentives on foreign direct investment in China

Scholes and Wolfson 1989, Scholes and Wolfson 1992) argue that tax rules jointly influence investment decisions and organizational form. The present research uses Chinese data to test these assertions. Specifically, our study investigates whether (1) the creation of special tax incentive zones is an effective tax policy for China to induce new foreign direct investment (FDI) into specific regions, and (2) changes in the tax rules influence the particular form of foreign direct investment selected: equity joint ventures, contractual joint ventures, and wholly foreign-owned enterprises. Our results indicate that tax incentives are effective in attracting FDI to China, and moreover, influence the selection of a particular form of FDI. One limitation of our study is that we were unable to completely control for the correlated-omitted-variable problem.     

税率锚定效应与企业投资决策

已有文献证实了高管过度自信等非理性因素对企业投资决策的影响,但尚未有文献研究锚定心理在投资决策中的作用。税收政策连续性不足会使得企业实际税率充满不确定性,高管在预测未来实际税率时很可能会非理性地锚定当期的高税率,进而产生税率锚定行为。本文研究这种非理性的税率锚定行为对企业投资决策的影响,结果发现:企业投资决策中存在显著的税率锚定行为,对高税率的锚定显著降低了企业未来的投资支出,且内在锚效应(纵向对比)强于外在锚效应(横向对比)。进一步地,我们发现经验更丰富的高管有助于缓解投资中的税率锚定效应,但更大的税率波动性加剧了这种效应,最终降低了公司业绩和价值。本文研究表明,控制投资中的税率锚定行为,有利于提高投资效率和企业价值,同时也表明保持宏观税收政策连续性有利于促进企业健康可持续发展。     

Should short-term speculators be taxed,or subsidised?

Summary This paper explores the welfare implications of a securities transaction tax when long-term information contained in stock prices can improve resource allocation but speculators have short horizon objectives. Speculators can trade on information of differing time horizons and profit maximizing firms can use long-term information contained in stock prices to improve their investment decisions. The model takes full account of the effect of a tax on market liquidity and welfare for all market participants. Surprisingly, a subsidy on short-term speculation can increase the amount of equilibrium trade on long-horizon information. This is because short-term informed trade exerts a positive externality over long-term informed trade when speculators have a short planning horizon. The cost of paying the subsidy may be smaller than the gain in firm value, while no trader is made worse off.This paper is a revised version of chapter 4 of my Ph.D. dissertation written at the European University Institute. I wish to thank Paolo Battigalli, James Dow, Thierry Foucault, Rainer Kiefer, Matt Spiegel, Erik Theissen, the co-editor and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. I would also like to thank audiences at the workshop of the ESSFM Gerzensee and EFA Annual Meetings 2000.     

一个有远见的税收制度应当关注未来的税基——特朗普新税法的成本分析及政策建议

20世纪50年代以来,美国企业所得税税率持续下降,政府税收收入也处于较低水平。2017年,特朗普新税法的实施大幅度降低了企业所得税税率,导致政府税收损失远超预期。然而,新税法实施后,美国企业投资和长期经济增长并没有明显改善。本文认为,一个国家经济效率主要取决于税基而非税率,美国政府应通过税收制度改革,增加对企业投资和研发投入的激励,从而扩大税基,实现经济的长期改善。     

政府投资代建制的模式和进一步规范的建议

代建制的实行将使现行的政府投资体制中“投资、建设、管理、使用”四位一体的管理模式各环节彼此分离,互相制约。政府选择具有相应资质的项目管理公司,并作为项目建设期的法人,负责项目建设的全程组织和管理,通过合同来约束代建单位。代建制在一定程度上减少了政府投资的浪费,有利于提高投资效益。如何在实践中进一步实施好代建制,是值得研究的课题。     

Investment income taxes and private equity acquisition activity

Utilizing a novel identification strategy, we uncover evidence that reducing the investment income tax rate increases acquisition activity by private equity acquirers. Applying a difference-in-difference methodology, we find that acquisitions sponsored by private equity firms nearly doubled following the investment income tax rate reductions associated with the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 and the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003. We attribute our findings to private equity fund structures and managing partners’ ability to capture the expected benefit of lower capital gains tax rates. These findings are robust to controlling for target shareholders’ tax incentives, as well as firm, industry, and macroeconomic factors possibly influencing acquisition activity.     

Some Implications of Changing the Tax Basis for Pension Funds

Governments in many developed economies provide private pension plans with significant taxation incentives. However, as many retirement income systems are now being reviewed due to demographic, social and economic pressures, these taxation arrangements are also under scrutiny. This paper discusses some of the implications of the differences between the traditional taxation treatment adopted by most OECD nations and that adopted by Australia, where there is a tax on contributions, a tax on investment earnings and a tax on benefits. The results show that there are significant differences in the net value of the benefits received by individuals and the taxation revenue received by the government. On the other hand, it is shown that there is remarkably little to distinguish between the two tax structures in terms of summary measures of lifetime income, although the form in which the benefit is taken in retirement is significant in influencing intragenerational equity.     

论低消费和高投资状况下我国财产税改革

我国目前低消费和高投资的经济状况不能长期持续下去。通过调整税收政策,使我国的宏观税基更多地依赖于储蓄或投资而不是消费,有利于提高消费率,改善消费和投资之间的比例,使经济增长具有长期的可持续性。财产税对财产存量征税,使我国的宏观税基更多地依赖于储蓄而不是消费,有利于降低储蓄,刺激消费。因此,通过财产税改革,增强财产税在我国税制结构中的地位,扩大财产税的征税范围和税基,加强财产税的累进性,开征新的财产税税种如遗产与赠与税,有利于提高消费率,改善消费和投资的比例。