Economic Policy Uncertainty And Enterprise Innovation

After the financial crisis in 2008,new trends emerged in the global industrial restructuring,and many countries put forward industrial restructuring strategies to enhance national innovation capacity and enhance core competitive advantages,such as the "re-industrialization" strategy of the United States,the "industry 4.0" strategy of Germany and the "made in China 2025" plan of China.At the same time,China's economy has entered a new normal and faces the challenge of overcoming the "middle-income trap".The traditional way of economic growth driven by factor scale is no longer sustainable,and factor quality and technological progress have become the new driving forces.Therefore,innovation has become the engine driving China's sustained medium-high speed economic growth.However,while countries are adjusting their industrial structures to boost the real economy and enhance their international competitiveness,they are also frequently adjusting their current economic policies to stabilize their economic operations,resulting in uncertainties in their economic policies.Under the current situation of "focusing on innovation is to focus on development,and innovation is to focus on the future",under the background of the current global economic fluctuations and the transformation and upgrading of China's industrial structure,uncertainty has become a key factor affecting the innovation of Chinese enterprises.Therefore,based on the Shanghai and shenzhen a-share listed companies in China from 2008 to 2017 years of r&d,invention patent applications and utility model patent applications as the research object,by Baker,Bloom and Davis,three academics index compiled by the China economic policy uncertainty measure uncertainty of economic policy in our country,based on the theory of literature and,in the reality in our country as the background,to discuss the relationship between economic policy uncertainty and enterprise innovation,and from the enterprise heterogeneity,enterprise financing situation and the external environment three angles to study the influence on this relationship,try to find the difference of theimpact of different enterprises,Explore ways and means to stimulate enterprise innovation vitality.Through theoretical analysis and empirical analysis,this paper finds that economic policy uncertainty has incentive effect on enterprise innovation.Economic policy uncertainty has a more incentive effect on innovation activities of state-owned enterprises,high-tech industries,enterprises with abundant cash flow,enterprises with small financing constraints,enterprises with more government subsidies and enterprises with high marketization degree in their provinces.In addition,when the uncertainty of economic policy rises,the competitiveness of non-state-owned enterprises and non-high-tech industries is weak,and the selection and promotion of innovative projects are passive,leading to the lag of patent application.Abundant cash flow and small financing constraints reduce the impact of capital chain rupture and financial friction on enterprise innovation.The current market mechanism is difficult to encourage enterprises to spontaneously allocate resources to innovative projects,and the government still needs to guide enterprises to increase research and development investment through policy means.The output of innovation depends on the degree of marketization.There are four innovations in this paper:(1)when most previous literatures studied the relationship between economic policy uncertainty and enterprise innovation,the specific realistic background was not clear.Therefore,the research conclusions may vary with the observation background and observation period.This paper clarifies the realistic background of the research conclusion,that is,the background of the repeated oscillation of global economy and the transformation and upgrading of China's industrial structure after the 2008 financial crisis,which makes the conclusion more meaningful for reference.(2)most of the previous literature did not specify the source of uncertainty,and the way to measure uncertainty also had shortcomings.This paper aims to explore how the uncertainty caused by frequent adjustment of economic policies will affect enterprise innovation,and measures the uncertainty of China's economic policies with the index compiled by Baker and other three scholars.The index covers all aspects of the economy,such as interest rates,taxes,monetary policy,trade,etc.,and has good continuity and variability.(3)most previous literatures only examined enterprise innovation from the perspective of r&d investment.This paper measures enterprise innovation from three aspects: r&d input,invention patent application amount and utility model patent application amount.In other words,it explores the impact of economic policy uncertainty on enterprise innovation from the perspectives of innovation input and innovation output.(4)when most previous literatures studied economic policy uncertainty and enterprise innovation,they often unilaterally studied the influence of one or several factors on the relationship between them.In this paper,multi-dimensional,multi-level systematic study of corporate heterogeneity,corporate capital and the regulatory effect of the external environment.Therefore,this paper can provide more comprehensive policy ideas for the government and enterprises to promote enterprise innovation.