IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/mes/emfitr/v59y2023i6p1748-1766.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Digital Transformation and Within-Firm Pay Gap: Evidence from China

Author

Listed:
  • Gaowen Kong
  • Jiating Huang
  • Shasha Liu

Abstract

This paper examines the effect of digital transformation on pay gap between executives and employees using a large panel of listed companies in China spanning 2013–2020. Baseline results show that digital transformation of enterprises can largely increase the pay gap. Mechanism tests show that the digital transformation of enterprises increases the income of executives and ordinary employees, and the income of executives is increasing faster than ordinary employees. Furthermore, employee’s skill level is an important influence mechanism of the effect of digital transformation on within pay gap. Heterogeneity analysis finds that this effect is more pronounced in firms with fierce industry competition, traditional firms, large firms, and firms with lower shareholdings of executives. Lastly, we find that the pay gap induced by digital transformation enhances corporate performance. Overall, this study complements the determinants of compensation structure from a new perspective of digital transformation.

Suggested Citation

  • Gaowen Kong & Jiating Huang & Shasha Liu, 2023. "Digital Transformation and Within-Firm Pay Gap: Evidence from China," Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(6), pages 1748-1766, May.
  • Handle: RePEc:mes:emfitr:v:59:y:2023:i:6:p:1748-1766
    DOI: 10.1080/1540496X.2022.2149262
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/1540496X.2022.2149262
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/1540496X.2022.2149262?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Yue, Jun & Li, Yilin, 2023. "Media attention and corporate greenwashing behavior: Evidence from China," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 55(PB).
    2. Jiang, Airu, 2023. "The impact of digital finance on online shopping," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 56(C).
    3. Xuan, Ziyue & Guo, Wenting & Lan, Faqin, 2023. "Underwriters interest binding and IPO underpricing," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    4. Jia, Shanghui & Guo, Nannan & Liu, Yingke, 2023. "Electricity shortage and corporate digital transformation: Evidence from China's listed firms," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    5. Liu, Shasha & Zhao, Huixian & Kong, Gaowen, 2023. "Enterprise digital transformation, breadth of ownership and stock price volatility," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    6. Zhu, Wenpeng, 2023. "Digital financial inclusion and the share of labor income: Firm-level evidence," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 56(C).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:mes:emfitr:v:59:y:2023:i:6:p:1748-1766. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/MREE20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.