Narrow Results

China introduced the value-added tax (VAT) rate reform in 2017 to reduce the burden on firms and stimulate the economy. This study builds a simple theoretical framework and employs the 2017 VAT rate reform as a quasi-natural experiment to evaluate the effects of the VAT rate reform on the corporate tax burden. We find that the VAT rate reform significantly reduces the corporate total tax burden by 9.1% (an effect mainly driven by the decrease in the VAT burden), while the reform has no significant impact on enterprise income tax burden. Furthermore, the effects of VAT reduction on the corporate tax burden are primarily significant in firms with lower intermediate input ratios, firms facing lower market monopolies, firms from eastern China and firms with high-fixed assets.

Using the green patent data of A-share listed companies in China’s heavy pollution industry from 2011 to 2020, this paper empirically tests the effect of tax reduction on the green innovation level of enterprises. The findings are as follows: First, tax reduction can significantly improve the level of green innovation. Second, R&D investment is one of the influencing mechanisms of tax reduction to improve the level of green innovation. Third, the incentive effect of tax reduction on the green innovation level of enterprises is more significant in non-state-owned enterprises, and the green innovation level increases by about 3.013% for every 1% reduction in tax burden. Fourthly, after the robustness test, the conclusion of the paper still stands. Finally, this paper puts forward some suggestions on how tax reduction can improve enterprise green innovation.