高階主管與員工薪資差距對企業生產力之影響

Research on the pay disparity between top managers and employees is typically based on economic and behavioral perspectives to explore the relationship between the pay disparity and the firm productivity or performance. Theeconomic view is mainly derived from tournament theory, which predicts that the widening pay gap can have an incentive effect on employees and enhance their motivation, thus contributing to firm performance and productivity. Behavioral arguments are based primarily on equity theory and relative deprivation theory, arguing that widening pay gaps can lead to feelings of unfairness among employees, lower employee morale, and thus have a negative impact on firm performance and productivity. The results of empirical studies are not consistent, so some studies attempt to integrate tournament theory with equity theory/relative deprivation theory to understand the application of different theories. For the purpose of theoretical integration, this study will develop a new analytical framework and construct panel (longitudinal) data to conduct a research on how the manager-employee pay disparity affects firm productivity. Through the analysis of panel data, the study focuses on the adjustment (change) of the pay disparity between top managers and employees, and establishes an econometric model to break it down into two parts of the adjustment with different natures. The first part is an adjustment based on the pay disparity deviation from the optimal pay disparity. Because pay adjustments are costly, the previous year's pay disparity is often not adjusted quickly to the optimal value, so firms may make cross-year pay disparity adjustments based on deviation values. This part of the pay disparity adjustment can be reasonably explained by the firm's characteristics, with less implication of relative deprivation awareness; therefore, compared with the equity/relative deprivation theory, the tournament theory willbe more applicable. The second part is the change of pay disparity that cannot be explained by the firm's characteristic factors. This part has the meaning of inequality, and is easy to arouse the perception of employee's unfairness and deprivation; therefore, the equity/relative deprivation theory will be more applicable than the tournament theory. The study will examine the impact of these two different pay disparity adjustments on changes in a firm's productivity, which is measured by total factor productivity (TFP) of the firm. It is expected that this study will provide findings that differ from previous literature and help to understand the dynamic patterns of the pay disparity between top managers and employees and their impact on firm productivity.