| The GVC(global value chain)position is an important representation of a firm’s export competitiveness.Since entering into the WTO,China has participated in the GVC rely on the labor endowment,and the sustained growth of exports has made a great contribution to economic development.However,the GVC position of China’s firms,controlled by developed countries,is generally located in the downstream "OEM" position,whose trade mode is substitutable and added value is low.Existing researches have shown that different GVC position not only have significant differences in value-added capacity,but also the GVC position of each country has an important impact on the overall stability of its value chain.Compared with the downstream links,products in the upstream link of GVC usually need to go through more flows of production when transferring final consumption.The nonsubstitutability of production capacity in the upstream sector is crucial to the stability of GVC.In fact,With the increasing impact of "anti-globalization events",the international division of Chinese firms based on processing trade is facing severe crises such as "low-end locking" and "neck-jamming".So,how to promote the international division jump,from the "OEM" position to the upstream,and improve the position of GVC,related to firms’ valueadded and the control of the "international economic cycle",is a key problem to be solved urgently at present.In practice,in order to promoting "China’s industry to move towards the high-end of the GVC",the government has adopted a series of policy incentives.As the important part of policy tools,whether tax incentives can promote firms’ transformation and GVC upgrading has been paid close attention by the academic community.On the one hand,tax incentives can effectively ease financing constraints of firms,improve production efficiency and resource endowment.On the other hand,due to the effects of the domestic market of exports,tax incentives can effectively increase exports and help the upgrading of firms’ GVC by improving the resource endowment.However,the existing literatures,about tax incentives and China’s GVC Upgrading,mainly focus on traditional trade model and the influence of trade benefits.This thesis empirically supplements the existing researches from the perspective of "GVC position",which will not only help Chinese firms break the dilemma of "low-end locking",but also provide a useful reference for the stabilization and upgrading of GVC of China’s manufacturing.Based on the above,this thesis,based on the key problem that "whether tax incentives can improve firms’ GVC position",empirically tests the impact of tax incentives on firms’ GVC position and its mechanism by measuring the positions of Chinese firms’ GVC and building a difference in difference model with China’s VAT reform.It is found that VAT reform can promote the upgrading of firms’ GVC position by promoting fixed asset investment,alleviating financing constraints,and improving total factor productivity.And the effect of VAT transformation on firms’ GVC position upgrading,compared with domestic firms,general trade firms,high-tech firms and capital-intensive firms,may be more significant for foreign-funded firms,processing trade firms,low-tech firms and laborintensive firms.The further research of extensive margin shows that VAT reform can significantly expand the variety of domestic products(export margins)and reduce the variety of imported products(import margins)while improving firms’ GVC position,that means VAT reform can promote firms to export new products with higher GVC position and promote "domestic intermediate products" to replace "imported intermediate products".This thesis may have the following contributions: First,this thesis,from the firms’ GVC position,provides a new perspective for the research of tax incentives and GVC upgrading.We find that the VAT transformation can help firms’ GVC position upgrading significantly,and further identify its internal mechanism.Secondly,from the perspective of extensive margin,this thesis decomposes the effect of firms’ GVC position upgrading,find that the VAT transformation can help firms expand export margins and reduce import margins,that means VAT reform can promote firms to use more domestic intermediate products,improve their export competitiveness and accelerate the local extension of GVC.Finally,this thesis uses the "quasi-natural experiment" of VAT transformation to identify the impact of tax incentives on firms’ GVC position and alleviate its possible endogeneity. |
