不確定性、高階經理人報償差距與公司績效之關連性：競賽理論之驗證

Relationships among Uncertainty, Top Management Pay Gap and Firm Performance: A Tale of Tournament Theory

競賽理論主張隨著監督困難性增加，高階經理人的報償差距可減少耗費成本的監督，並提供高階經理人與股東利益相符之誘因。當公司不確定性越高時，監督越困難，根據競賽理論預測隨著公司不確定性越高，高階經理人的報償差距應越大，即愈會發現高階經理人與下一層級經理人報償差距愈大，且公司不確定性與高階經理人報償差距之配合可改善公司績效。公司風險與盈餘雜訊均被認為代表公司不確定性，本文以風險與盈餘雜訊來代表不確定性，運用台灣上市上櫃公司之資料來驗證競賽理論，探討當公司風險或會計盈餘雜訊越高時，高階經理人報償差距是否愈大？結合公司不確定性與報償差距是否有助於公司的績效？本文實證結果可支持競賽理論之大部分預測。

Tournament theory asserts that top management pay gaps reduce the need of costly supervision and provides the incentive alignment of CEO and shareholders as monitoring become tougher. Monitoring is particularly difficult in uncertain environments. Based on the tournament theory, this paper predicts that top management pay gaps will be greater in firms with higher uncertainty. That is, the phenomenon that the larger pay gap exists between firm's CEO and its other top executive is more. Furthermore, the combination of higher uncertainty and greater top management pay gaps will enhance firm performance. Such uncertainty is also known as firm risk and noise in earnings. This paper considered these two different types of uncertainty. Using the research samples of firms listed in the Taiwan Stock Exchange and OTC stock exchange, this paper used the tournament theory to test whether top management pay gaps are greater in higher uncertain environments. Does the combination of higher uncertainty and greater top management pay gaps enhance firm performance? Most of the predictions of tournament theories can be supported by empirical results in this study.