創新與租稅規避間之關聯性─ 以台灣上市櫃公司為例

Abstract

依傳統理論觀點，公司的租稅規避行為將能減少公司租稅負擔，使稅後純益增加，有利企業價值提升，並進一步增加股東利益。然而，租稅規避行為雖帶來效益亦會產生成本，故在考量稅務風險及代理問題下，租稅規避不一定能增加股東利益。本研究主要在探討台灣上市櫃創新公司與租稅規避之間的關聯性，在創新指標衡量上有別於過去文獻採用研發費用予以衡量，而係採用代表創新產出及創新品質的專利權數量、專利權被引證數及專利家族等共計13個指標予以衡量，並與代表租稅規避指標的有效稅率及財稅差異等共計5個指標進行迴歸檢測。實證結果發現，除專利權數量、人均專利權數量及人均專利權被引證數與租稅規避呈顯著負相關外，其餘創新指標，均與租稅規避呈顯著正相關，與傳統理論論點相符，代表越創新的公司，越會進行租稅規避行為。

According to the traditional theory, tax avoidance will reduce the tax burden of an enterprise, increase its net profit after tax, enhance the enterprise value, and further promote the shareholders` interests. However, benefits from tax avoidance often come with a price, and it does not necessarily increase shareholder`s interest in consideration of tax risk and agency problem. This study aims mainly to explore the interrelationship between Taiwanese innovative listed enterprises and their tax avoidance behaviors. Different from previous studies where research expenditure is used as the innovation index, this study uses thirteen indicators, which represent innovation productivity and innovation quality, such as patent counts, patent citations and patent family and etc. Furthermore, the regression testing of this study is established with five parameters indicating tax avoidance behaviors such as effective tax rate and book-tax difference and etc. The empirical results show that, except for patent counts, the number of patents per capita and the number of citations per capita, remaining innovation indicators are significantly positively correlated with tax avoidance, and this is consistent with the traditional theoretical argument, which claims that the more innovative the enterprise is, the more tax avoidance behavior it engages in.