ABSTRACT

This paper investigates the relationship between economic policy uncertainty (EPU) and corporate intellectual capital (IC) investment. The empirical results, which are based on a wide range of econometric tests, demonstrate a negative impact of EPU on IC investment, thus lending support to the notion that EPU hinders corporate IC investment. The analysis also indicates that the negative impact of EPU on IC investment varies cross-sectionally. It is prominent only in large firms and financially constrained firms, suggesting such firms reduce or delay IC investment during heightened EPU periods. EPU does not significantly affect the IC investment in small firms and firms with less financial constraints. Our findings are broadly consistent with existing studies in the literature and remain qualitatively unchanged after a battery of robustness and endogeneity tests.

摘要

本文研究了经济政策不确定性 (EPU) 与企业智力资本 (IC) 投资之间的关系。基于广泛的计量经济学检验的实证结果表明，EPU 对 IC 投资有负面影响，从而支持 EPU 阻碍企业 IC 投资的观点。分析还表明，EPU 对 IC 投资的负面影响因横截面而异。它仅在大公司和财务受限的公司中很突出，表明这些公司在 EPU 增加期间减少或延迟 IC 投资。EPU 不会显着影响小公司和财务约束较少的公司的 IC 投资。