资本赠款能否提高微型企业生产率？
Do capital grants improve microenterprise productivity?
The Economic Journal · 2025 · [{"name": "Laurin Janes", "affiliation": ["Organisation de Coopération et de Développement Economiques", "Foreign and Commonwealth Office", "Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office", "Imperial College London"]}, {"name": "Michael Koelle", "affiliation": ["Organisation de Coopération et de Développement Economiques", "Foreign and Commonwealth Office", "Imperial College London"]}, {"name": "Simon Quinn", "affiliation": ["Organisation de Coopération et de Développement Economiques", "Foreign and Commonwealth Office", "Imperial College London"]}]
中文摘要
资本赠款能否提高微型企业生产率？我们从生产函数的视角，重新考察了此前两项向微型企业配置资本的随机对照试验（RCT）。我们发现，处理组企业的生产率更高，且这一生产率提升解释了资本赠款收入效应的约20%–30%。尽管长期估计的噪声较大，但点估计表明，这些生产率效应在赠款发放六年后仍然持续。我们探讨了这一发现的可能机制，结果显示处理使资产构成向技术含量更高的耐用品倾斜，这一结果与资本体现型技术发挥重要作用的解释相一致。中介分析证实，处理对生产率的影响几乎完全可以由采用更高技术含量的耐用品来解释。
Abstract
Abstract Do capital grants improve microenterprise productivity? We use the lens of a production function to re-examine two previous randomised controlled trials that allocated capital to microenterprises. We find that productivity is higher for treated firms, and accounts for about 20%–30% of the revenue effects of capital grants. Although long-run estimates are noisy, point estimates indicate that these productivity effects are sustained six years after the grants. We explore possible mechanisms for this finding, and show that treatment tilts the asset composition towards durables with a higher-technology component: a result consistent with an important role for capital-embodied technology. Mediation analysis confirms that virtually all of the effect of treatment on productivity can be explained by the adoption of higher-technology durables.