本研究以1998年至2016年在臺灣證券交易所及中華民國櫃檯買賣中心掛牌交易的上市櫃公司為研究樣本,探討企業經營團隊的政治背景或企業政治關聯性是否會顯著地影響該公司的租稅規避行為或租稅規避的積極程度。在控制內生性問題之下,實證結果發現具有政治關聯的企業之長期現金有效稅率相對較低,顯示擁有政治關聯性之企業愈傾向運用本身的政治資源從事租稅規避。其中,相較於擁有政治背景之經理人而言,擁有政治背景之董事會成員對於企業從事租稅規避行為更具有影響力;擁有民選公職政治背景對於企業租稅規避行為的影響力將更甚於擁有官派公職政治背景。因此,本研究將建議對於租稅規避需求較高的企業,應遴選具有政治背景之經理人或董事會成員以達成租稅規避目的。
Using stocks listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange and the Taipei Exchange during the period of 1998 through 2016, this study is aimed to investigate whether political connection of a company’s board members and management teams will affect its behavior of tax avoidance. After controlling for endogeneity problem, empirical results show that politically connected firms have significantly lower long-term cash effective tax rate than nonconnected firms, indicating companies with political connections tend to use their political resources to avoid taxes. In particular, corporate insiders with political connections will have more influential on tax avoidance than those with political connections. The impact of political connections on tax avoidance is stronger, if such political connections are built upon government officers, congressperson, or city councilmen, who were elected democratically. Overall, this study suggests that companies with higher demand on tax avoidance should hire managers or board members who own political positions before.