Incentive Contract Design and Employee-Initiated Innovation: Evidence from the Field*

This study examines how the design of incentive contracts for tasks defined as workers' official responsibilities (i.e., standard tasks) influences workers' propensity to engage in employee-initiated innovation (EII). EII corresponds to innovation activities that are not formally assigned to workers but are nonetheless encouraged and considered to be important for the company's success. Like other extra-role behaviors, EII is difficult to incentivize directly. Therefore, it is important to understand whether and how explicit incentive contracts designed for the workers' standard tasks may indirectly influence their EII activity. We use field data from a manufacturing company that uses a dedicated information system to track workers' EII idea submissions. We find theory-consistent evidence that, compared to workers receiving fixed pay, employees rewarded for their standard tasks with variable compensation contracts exhibit a lower propensity to engage in EII. This result is concentrated among ideas benefiting other constituents and activities beyond the proponents' standard task (i.e., broad-scope ideas). In contrast, we find no difference attributable to standard task incentive design in the proposal of innovation ideas narrowly focused on the proponent's standard task (i.e., narrow-scope ideas). Our findings suggest that variable pay narrows employees' conceptual focus around the standard task and hinders employee engagement in broad-scope innovation activities compared to fixed compensation contracts. We contribute to the literature on incentives for innovation by showing that standard task compensation contracts have spillover effects on EII behavior. We also contribute to the nascent literature on EII by showing that innovation types, defined based on their relation with the proponent's standard task, matter. Our results are relevant for practitioners in that managers relying on variable pay contracts to incentivize standard task performance should expect lower employee engagement in broad-scope EII.     

经济学视野下环境成本的会计内涵:规制驱动抑或责任驱动

从经济学的角度来看,环境是一项资产,对环境资源的使用应该付费。然而,环境资源负外部性效应的存在导致环境成本会计不可能在企业内部自动产生。是什么驱动企业等经济实体确认环境的使用成本,是环境规制的驱动抑或是环境责任的驱动？文章基于环境规制、环境责任与环境成本的联系来探讨环境成本的会计内涵,并厘清经济学与会计学不同观念上环境成本之间的关联度具重要的理论价值。     

央企高管薪酬激励、激励兼容与企业创新——基于薪酬管制的准自然实验

以2010—2018年我国央企和非国企上市公司相关样本为研究对象,对央企高管薪酬管制政策效应进行实证检验,并结合国企混合所有制改革这一政策背景,研究央企内部激励机制的兼容问题。利用双重差分模型(DID)和三重差分模型(DDD)检验的结果表明,相较于不受薪酬管制政策影响的非国企样本而言,薪酬管制政策抑制了央企的研发投入水平;股权激励有助于缓解薪酬管制对央企研发投入的负相关关系;进一步研究发现,薪酬管制政策对央企研发投入水平的抑制强度在不同功能定位的央企之间存在差异。     

Incentive and Dilution Effects of Employee Stock Bonuses and Stock Options: Evidence from Taiwan

Employee stock bonuses (ESBs) and employee stock options (ESOs) are the means for high-technology companies in Taiwan to reward their employees. This research connects the Ohlson (1995 Ohlson, JA. 1995. Earnings, book values, and dividends in equity valuation. Contemporary Accounting Research, 11: 661–687. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) model and Linear Structural Relations (LISREL) model to investigate these effects of ESBs and ESOs, respectively, for a sample of high-technology companies in Taiwan. I generate two empirical generalizations. (1) The incentive effects of ESBs are significantly associated with performance, thus enhancing firm value; in addition, the incentive effects of ESBs are greater than the dilution effects. (2) The incentive effects of ESOs are also significantly associated with performance, whereas the dilution effects of ESOs are insignificant. Although evidence supports the incentive effects of providing ESOs and ESBs, it is debatable whether ESOs and ESBs dilute shareholders’ equity.     

Regulation,Institutions and Aggregate Investment: New Evidence from OECD Countries

This paper investigate the relationship linking investment (capital stock) and structural policies. Using a panel of 32 OECD countries from 1985 to 2013, we show that more stringent product and labour market regulations are associated with less investment (lower capital stock). The paper also sheds light on the existence of non-linear effects of employment protection legislation (EPL) on the capital stock. Several alternative testing methods show that the negative influence of EPL is considerably stronger at higher levels. Finally, and importantly, the paper uncovers important policy interactions between product and labour market policies. Higher levels of product market regulations (covering state control, barriers to entrepreneurship and barriers to trade and investment) tend to amplify the negative relationships between EPL and the capital stock and ETCR and the capital stock. Equally important is the finding that the rule of law and the quality of (legal) institutions alters the overall impact of regulations on capital deepening: better institutions reduce the negative effect of more stringent product and labour market regulations on the capital stock, possibly through the reduction of uncertainty as regards the protection of property rights. This result also implies that the benefit from product and labour market reforms may be smaller in countries with weaker institutions.     

Asymmetric Regulation and Airport Dominance in International Aviation: Evidence from the London-New York Market

International airline markets have the rather unusual feature of partial deregulation with asymmetric regulatory constraints: Some carriers face entry restrictions different from others for a given route. Like domestic air travel, international travel also features hubs, where a single carrier may dominate a given airport. This article examines the effects of asymmetric regulation and airport dominance on airlines' fares in the London-New York market, a market uniquely suited for identifying the effects of both of these issues. Comparison data from the symmetrically regulated Frankfurt-New York and Paris-New York markets enable a difference-in-differences identification strategy. Regulatory restrictions are found to decrease an affected carrier's fares, whereas airport dominance increases a dominant airline's fares.     

Regulation and the Valuation Relevance of Book Value and Earnings: Evidence from the United States*

Electric utilities in the United States are subject to a cost-plus normal profits pricing that is designed to align the market value of equity with the balance sheet book value. Perfect alignment implies the equality of the market and book values. Extant empirical evidence suggests that, for these utilities, actual cost/profit recovery does not follow a pure cost-plus pricing, raising the prospect that income statement items contribute to the determination of market value. What is not obvious is the extent to which the noted departure from pure cost-plus pricing results in misalignment of the market and book values, or the relative contribution of income statement items to the valuation of electric utility shares. This study pursues this question, using benchmark results for a sample of manufacturing firms to highlight the degree of market-to-book alignment for regulated and competitive firms. The results show a considerable alignment of the market and book values for utilities. In examining the relevance of book value and income statement items in the determination of market value, it is found that the contribution of earnings level to explaining market value diminishes markedly in the presence of book value for electric utilities, and the contribution of earnings change to explaining returns diminishes markedly in the presence of earnings levels. Earnings level complements book value in explaining market value for manufacturing firms, while earnings change complements earnings level in explaining returns. The results further show that the market and accounting values exhibit pronounced misalignments in returns-earnings models, especially for utilities.     

Audit Regulation and Cost of Equity Capital: Evidence from the PCAOB's International Inspection Regime*

This study investigates the relation between audit regulation and cost of equity capital. There is scant empirical evidence on this relation because changes in audit regulation are frequently accompanied by other major regulatory changes. We exploit variation in the timing of regulatory changes induced by foreign governments' staggered allowance of PCAOB inspections. Using a difference-in-differences design, we find that foreign SEC registrants with auditors from countries that allow PCAOB inspections enjoy a lower cost of capital, relative to foreign SEC registrants with auditors from countries that prohibit inspections. Furthermore, we find that this cost of capital effect is attenuated for companies with higher-quality governance mechanisms. Finally, we document that inspection access is associated with higher-quality analyst forecasts, which suggests that this change in audit regulation reduces information risk for market participants.     

公司治理的竞争效应与规制效应分析——来自中国A股上市公司的证据

研究以中国2003—2007年所有A股上市公司为样本,借鉴Chhaoehharia和Laeven（2007,2009）以及白重恩（2005）的方法构建公司治理指数,发现公司治理结构与绩效之间存在显著的相关关系。外部董事比例、高管持股量、第一大股东持股比例、第二至第十大股东股权集中度、公司在其它市场挂牌上市以及政府控股等对绩效都有显著影响,在长期内,公司治理的竞争效应优于规制效应。这为中国公司治理改革应该更多依靠市场调节还是依赖政府干预提供了实证依据。     

高管激励、环境规制与企业环保投入

以2012-2015年重污染上市企业为样本,研究了环境规制、高管激励与企业环保投入之间的关系。研究表明,环境规制能显著影响企业环保投入的可能性,同时高管激励能强化环境规制对企业环保投入的作用。进一步地,按照企业产权性质对样本进行分类回归,发现民营企业的环保投入对环境规制不再显著,而国有企业的环境规制依旧显著,说明在本研究分析的时间段,国有企业是国家环保事业的主要政策承担者,民营企业的环保行为除了受到环境规制的压力,还决定于企业的规模和财力。     

The Impact of Regulation on Utilities’ Investments: A Survey and New Evidence from the Energy Industry

Over the last 30 years, regulated sectors have undergone deep reforms in their institutional configuration, tools and goals. This paper reviews the impact of this evolution on energy firms’ investments. First, we survey the existing evidence on the effects of the presence of independent regulatory agencies on utilities’ investment rates in Europe in the MENA countries, and in Latin America, focussing on the role of de facto independence and the institutional framework. Second, we discuss the impact of incentive- versus rate-of-return regulation on firms’ incentives to invest and the interaction with firm private/public ownership. In this regard, we provide new econometric evidence of the recent developments of regulation, using a sample of European energy utilities tracked from 1997 to 2013. Our results confirm previous findings that investment is higher under incentive regulation than under rate of return regulation. However, differently from the earlier results, we find that investments seem to be driven more by the weighted average cost of capital than by the X-factor. The paper concludes reviewing recent evidence on service quality regulation on firm investment specifically on the impact of reward/penalty schemes on capital and operational expenditures.     

Trading Prior to the Disclosure of Material Information: Evidence from Regulation Fair Disclosure Form 8‐Ks*

Regulation Fair Disclosure (Reg FD) Form 8‐K filings provide a venue where managers release information to the market as a whole that they designate as being material. Using this setting, we study trading patterns immediately prior to the public disclosure of material information. We offer three main results. First, using both intraday and daily trading data, we find abnormal trading volume of 21 percent (13 percent) in the hour (day) prior to the public disclosure, respectively. Second, we find that this pre‐disclosure abnormal trading volume is concentrated in firms that are smaller, have more growth opportunities, issue fewer voluntary disclosures, and have weaker external monitoring. Finally, we find that this pre‐disclosure volume is concentrated in subsamples in which the information relates to a firm's material contracts, a firm holds investor/analyst conferences, and there is insider trading activity in a firm's shares. Our results do not concentrate in a small number of firms or industries, and do not appear to be explained by the form through which managers first release the material information (e.g., Form 8‐K, press release, website posting, or social media). Our results are also robust to controlling for the firm's other filings and peer filings that occur around the disclosure. Overall, the trading patterns we document may show that, inconsistent with the spirit of Reg FD, a subset of investors trade on information managers deem material prior to its broad, public release.     

环境规制对产业转移的影响——来自新建制造业企业选址的证据

利用城市一级数据,本文运用泊松模型考察了环境规制对中国新建制造业企业选址的影响,基于增量变化的视角考察了环境规制对产业转移的影响。本文的实证研究结果显示,总体上看,在全国范围内环境规制对新建企业的迁入具有显著的约束作用,环境约束越放松的地方越容易吸引污染型企业,即存在“污染避难所”效应。通过对东中西三个地区进行的比较研究,本文进一步发现,“污染避难所”效应无论是在东部地区内部,还是在东部地区和中西部地区之间都十分显著,环境规制对新建企业的迁入有显著的约束作用;但是在中西部地区内部则没有显著的表现。以上结果表明,“污染避难所”效应呈现一定的梯度特征。     

政府干预、共同代理与企业污染减排激励——基于二氧化硫排放量省际面板数据的实证检验

为了从理论和实证上分析"企业污染减排激励为什么缺乏"这一问题,本文在一个双重任务的共同代理框架下,研究了企业污染减排的激励机制和制度环境,并收集了2001-2007年二氧化硫排放量的省际面板数据,对理论模型进行实证检验.理论模型表明,在污染减排与短期经济行为之间,存在投入成本替代的情形,经济产出带给地方政府的边际收益上升会弱化企业的减排激励;此外,来自各级政府的共同代理问题,也会损害企业的减排激励.实证结果表明,地方政府短期利益导向的行政干预越多,地区人均财政赤字水平越高,地方政府引进的外商直接投资越多,地区工业增长越快,经济产出带给地方政府的边际收益就越大,该地区企业的二氧化硫排放量就越难以控制;此外,地方政府规模越大,该辖区内企业所面临的委托人就越多,来自各级政府的共同代理问题就越严重,该地区企业的二氧化硫排放量也就越大,从而实证结果支持了本文的理论模型.     

内生信息结构下的激励性规制:一个完全承诺下的动态模型

本文研究了动态条件下基于信息结构内生化的激励性规制问题。假设规制机构具有完全的承诺能力,并且企业边际成本在两期保持不变。论文得出:内生信息结构下的动态最优规制合约是企业搜集信息的成本的分段函数,当信息搜集成本处于不同范围时,最优规制合约可能有三种形式:令企业在第一期搜集信息,令企业在第二期搜集信息以及令企业两期都不搜集信息。     

Income inequality and access to housing: Evidence from China

Economic theory suggests that income inequality predicts housing price and housing affordability for low-income households. Employing Chinese urban household survey data, this paper examines empirically the relationship between income inequality and access to housing for urban low-income households. The empirical results demonstrate that higher income inequality within cities is significantly related to a higher housing cost burden, a smaller per capita living space, and lower housing quality for low-income households. Further studies demonstrate that the negative impacts of income inequality could be moderated by product differentiation in housing markets, as a higher degree of differentiation in the size of housing units corresponds to a smaller effect of income inequality on housing affordability.