Firms' perception of economic policy uncertainty and the labor income share

IF 3.3 2区经济学 Q1 ECONOMICS

Economic Systems Pub Date : 2025-01-14 DOI:10.1016/j.ecosys.2025.101289

Libin Liu, Xu Si

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Abstract

The decline in the labor income share and its determinants has been widely discussed in recent decades. Using a sample of Chinese A-share listed firms from 2010 to 2020, this paper provides evidence of the impact of firms' subjective perceptions of economic policy uncertainty (FEPU) on the labor income share. Empirical results show that there is a significant decrease in the labor income share when firms perceive an increase in economic policy uncertainty. Cash payments to employees and related employee benefits tend to decline when firms perceive a rise in economic policy uncertainty, which leads to a lower labor income share when total operating revenue remains unchanged. Additionally, workers' bargaining power moderates this negative effect. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that the negative effect of FEPU on the labor income share is weaker or insignificant for high-skill-intensive firms, high-technology-intensive firms, low-capital-intensive firms, and central state-owned firms. This paper sheds new light on the factors contributing to the decline in the labor income share and provides relevant policy implications for the stabilization of the labor income share.

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企业对经济政策不确定性的感知与劳动收入份额

近几十年来，劳动收入份额的下降及其决定因素已被广泛讨论。本文以2010 - 2020年中国a股上市公司为样本，实证了企业对经济政策不确定性的主观认知对劳动收入占比的影响。实证结果表明，当企业感知到经济政策的不确定性增加时，劳动收入占比显著下降。当企业认为经济政策的不确定性上升时，员工的现金支付和相关的员工福利倾向于下降，这导致在总营业收入保持不变的情况下，劳动收入占比降低。此外，工人的议价能力缓和了这种负面影响。异质性分析表明，在高技能密集型企业、高技术密集型企业、低资本密集型企业和中央国有企业中，劳动生产率对劳动收入占比的负向影响较弱或不显著。本文揭示了劳动收入占比下降的原因，并为稳定劳动收入占比提供了相关的政策启示。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Economic Systems ECONOMICS-

CiteScore

4.90

自引率

0.00%

发文量

审稿时长

48 days

期刊介绍： Economic Systems is a refereed journal for the analysis of causes and consequences of the significant institutional variety prevailing among developed, developing, and emerging economies, as well as attempts at and proposals for their reform. The journal is open to micro and macro contributions, theoretical as well as empirical, the latter to analyze related topics against the background of country or region-specific experiences. In this respect, Economic Systems retains its long standing interest in the emerging economies of Central and Eastern Europe and other former transition economies, but also encourages contributions that cover any part of the world, including Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, or Africa.