Research On The Impact And Heterogeneity Of Environmental Regulation On Corporate Wage Level

With the continuous advancement of the reform and opening-up process,China’s economy has ushered in a golden period of rapid development,and the people’s income has also been rising.However,it should be noted that China’s ecological and environmental problems are still serious and are constraints to high-quality economic development.Therefore,in order to solve the problem of environmental pollution as soon as possible and achieve the goal of "the level of ecological environment protection being compatible with building a well-off society in an all-round way",strict environmental regulatory policies must be adopted.However,the implementation of relevant policies will not only bring about’compliance costs’ ’ to enterprises,but also prompt enterprises to increase profits by adopting technological innovations and increasing labor productivity,which in turn will affect their wages.Under the government’s environmental regulation policies,can environmental protection and corporate wage growth achieve a win-win situation? Are there any different paths for the effect of environmental regulations on corporate wage levels? Are there heterogeneities in the effects of environmental regulations on the corporate wage levels in different regions and different types of enterprises? This thesis will carry out systematic research around these issues.(1)This thesis makes a theoretical analysis on the effect of environmental regulations on the level of corporate wages and its regional and corporate heterogeneity.The results show that environmental regulations may affect the wage level of enterprises through industrial agglomeration,labor productivity and technological innovation.In addition,environmental regulations may have different effects on the wage levels of enterprises in different regions in terms of technological innovation,industrial structure upgrading,employment and economic growth.Environmental regulations may have differential effects on the wage levels of different types of enterprises in terms of corporate tax burden,corporate agglomeration,corporate external investment bias,and corporate financing constraints.(2)Based on the data of A-share listed companies from 2010 to 2017 and matched with the data of environmental regulation in 31 provinces,this thesis uses the panel fixed effect model to make empirical tests about the effects of environmental regulation on corporate wage level,regional and corporate heterogeneities.The study found that overall environmental regulations had reduced the wage levels of Chinese companies.The heterogeneity analysis results show that,in terms of regional heterogeneity,environmental regulation had a greater inhibitory effect on the wage level of enterprises in the central and western regions than that in the eastern region.And in terms of corporate heterogeneity,compared with non-state-owned enterprises,the inhibitory effect of environmental regulation on wage levels was stronger for state-owned enterprises.(3)This thesis uses the mediation effect model to test the three action paths of industrial agglomeration,labor productivity and technological innovation.The results show that industrial agglomeration,labor productivity,and technological innovation are all important pathways through which environmental regulations affect corporate wage levels.In terms of labor productivity,environmental regulations have reduced labor productivity,and labor productivity has significantly increased the level of corporate wages,indicating that the mediation effect exists;in terms of industrial agglomeration and technological innovation,Bootstrap mediation effect test results show that the confidence interval of the coefficients does not include zero.It shows that the indirect effect is significant,and the mediation effect is established.In summary,this thesis believes that environmental regulatory policies cannot be generalized.It is necessary to analyze the characteristics of different regions and the nature of different enterprises,and formulate appropriate policies based on the results of the analysis,so as to better promote technological innovation,improve labor productivity and leverage the spillover effects of industrial agglomeration to achieve a "win-win" environment and income.