银发经济背景下，竞争、创新与企业生产率之间的关系

The Relationship between Competition, Innovation, and Firm Productivity in the Context of the Silver Economy

摘要: 在银发经济背景下，本文研究了人口老龄化趋势下竞争、创新与企业生产率之间的关系。考虑到老龄化社会对产品与服务创新提出了新的要求，论文选取了三种代理变量来衡量企业的创新水平，分别为研发支出的自然对数、研发支出的一年增长率以及研发强度(研发支出占销售额的比例)。竞争程度以“1减去勒纳指数”(即利润与销售额之比)来表示，劳动生产率通过人均产出(销售额/员工总数)来衡量，并分别使用取自然对数和不取对数两种方式进行分析。基于全球涉及中老年人群的2500家企业的数据，研究发现：竞争与企业创新呈倒U型关系，即适度竞争最有利于企业在银发市场中进行技术和服务创新；同时，企业创新显著提升劳动生产率。

Abstract: In the context of the silver economy, this paper examines the relationship between competition, innovation, and firm productivity under the trend of population aging. Considering the increasing demand for product and service innovation in an aging society, three proxy variables are used to measure corporate innovation: the natural logarithm of R&D expenditure, the annual growth rate of R&D expenditure, and R&D intensity (the ratio of R&D expenditure to sales). The degree of competition is measured by “1 minus the Lerner Index” (i.e., the ratio of profit to sales), while labor productivity is assessed using per capita output (sales divided by the number of employees), analyzed both in logarithmic and non-logarithmic forms. Based on data from 2500 global firms involved in serving middle-aged and elderly populations, the study finds a U-shaped relationship between competition and corporate innovation, indicating that moderate competition is most conducive to technological and service innovation in the silver market. Furthermore, corporate innovation significantly enhances labor productivity.