Abstract: With the global economic growth slowing down, developed countries such as the United States are competing to reduce taxes and attract foreign direct investment. From the perspective of the labor cost and the market size, this paper constructs a model of FDI competition between China and the United States to discuss the difference in equilibrium tax levels between the two countries under the influence of the market size and the labor cost as well as the welfare effects of the labor costs and the trade costs in this framework. It is found that when the market size of the two countries is the same, the equilibrium tax rate is higher in the country with lower labor costs. When the labor cost and the market size of the two countries are dually asymmetrical, the equilibrium tax rate depends on the relative strength of the two forces. Only if the market size of the country with lower labor costs is above a certain level will the equilibrium tax level be higher than that of the other country. Taking China and the United States as examples, the numerical analysis with the data from 2013 to 2018 also shows that the asymmetry of the labor cost and the market size explains most of the difference in tax rates for the FDI competition between China and the United States. Therefore, this paper provides a new perspective as to the question whether China has no other choice but to adopt the strategy of entering a race for the bottom tax under the challenge of the US tax reduction.

Key words: Tax Competition, Labor Cost, Market Size, Foreign Direct Investment

摘要： 当前全球经济增长放缓,美国等发达国家竞相减税吸引外商直接投资。文章从劳动力成本、市场规模双重不对称的视角,构建了一个两国竞争FDI的理论模型,重点考察了两国均衡税收水平的差距。研究发现:市场规模相同时,劳动力成本较低国家的均衡税收较高;而劳动力成本、市场规模都不相同时,当且仅当劳动力成本较低国家的市场规模高于一定下限时,其均衡税收水平才高于另一国。以中美为例,本文利用2013~2018年两国相关数据的数值模拟分析也表明不对称税收竞争下的劳动力成本和市场规模因素解释了大部分FDI流动中两国税收差距的原因。介于此,在美国特朗普政府减税的挑战下,中国是否只能采用逐底型税收竞争策略,该研究提供了另外一种思路。

关键词: 税收竞争, 劳动力成本, 市场规模, 外商直接投资