Assessment of parent-subsidiary companies’ geographical distance effect on corporate social responsibility: a case of A-share listed companies

Figures & data

Table 1. Variable definitions.

Variables	Definition
CSR	The responsibility score of the professional evaluation system of corporate social responsibility report of Hexun Online
GeoDis	The natural logarithm of the average geography distance among the parent companies and their subsidiaries.
IC	The natural logarithm of DIB as measure of internal control index
SIZE	The natural logarithm as measure of total assets
Age	The natural logarithm of differences in current year and listing year of particular listed company
Lev	The listed company total liabilities ratio over total assets
Roe	The listed company net profit ratio over average net assets
TAT	The ratio of net sales over average total assets
LarHol	The proportion of the largest shareholders
CeoDu	Whether the chairman of listed company is also a general manager, 1 if yes, otherwise 0
Year	Year mock variable
Ind	Industry mock variable

Source: Authors compilation.

Table 2. Distribution of 22725 samples and CSR from 2010 to 2020.

Year	N	CSR
2010	1010	5.846
2011	1325	5.548
2012	1658	5.292
2013	1972	5.149
2014	2025	4.927
2015	2036	4.809
2016	2131	4.861
2017	2332	4.792
2018	2441	4.822
2019	2829	4.809
2020	2966	4.872

Source: Authors compilation.

Figure 1. Line chart of the average score of CSR in 2010–2020.

Source: Authors compilation.

Table 3. Descriptive statistics.

Variable	N	Min	Max	Mean	SD
CSR	22725	−15.000	30.000	4.986	4.322
GeoDis	22725	0.042	9.856	8.300	0.959
IC	22725	2.194	6.886	6.473	0.165
Size	22725	15.577	28.257	22.291	1.303
Age	22725	0.000	3.401	2.161	0.770
Lev	22725	0.008	1.806	0.443	0.218
Roe	22725	−69.717	3.644	0.019	1.173
TAT	22725	0.000	9.813	0.640	0.543
LarHol	22725	0.022	0.900	0.344	0.148
CeoDu	22725	0.000	1.000	0.251	0.434

Source: Authors compilation.

Table 4. Parent-subsidiary companies’ geographic distances and CSR.

Variable	CSR
	(1)	(2)	(3)
GeoDis	−0.170***	−0.172***	−0.173***
	(−5.54)	(−5.60)	(−5.60)
Size		0.132***	0.134***
		(4.68)	(4.62)
Age		0.465***	0.459***
		(11.37)	(10.81)
Lev		1.891***	1.892***
		(12.17)	(12.17)
Roe		0.371***	0.371***
		(6.01)	(6.00)
Tat		0.118**	0.120**
		(2.07)	(2.11)
LarHol			−0.101
			(−0.48)
CeoDu			−0.024
			(−0.38)
_cons	6.399***	1.552**	1.569**
	(24.90)	(2.51)	(2.52)
Year	YES	YES	YES
Industry	YES	YES	YES
N	22724	22724	22724
R^2	0.026	0.055	0.055
Adj R^2	0.022	0.051	0.051

Notes. Robust t-statistics in parentheses. ^*** p < 0.01; ^** p < 0.05; ^* p < 0.1.

Source: Authors compilation.

Table 5. Parent-subsidiary companies’ geographic distances, property nature and CSR.

Variable	State-owned firms	Non-state-owned firms
	(1)	(2)
GeoDis	−0.082*	−0.283***
	(−1.76)	(−7.01)
Size	0.307***	−0.034
	(6.63)	(−0.93)
Age	0.491***	0.460***
	(5.81)	(8.49)
Lev	2.228***	1.580***
	(8.50)	(8.28)
Roe	0.374***	0.360***
	(5.28)	(3.57)
Tat	0.198**	0.063
	(2.04)	(0.89)
LarHol	−0.395	−0.128
	(−1.04)	(−0.52)
CeoDu	−0.226	0.053
	(−1.38)	(0.76)
_cons	−3.100***	6.207***
	(−3.05)	(7.76)
Year	YES	YES
Industry	YES	YES
N	9055	13668
R^2	0.056	0.053
Adj R^2	0.047	0.047

Notes. Robust t-statistics in parentheses. ^*** p < 0.01; ^** p < 0.05; ^* p < 0.1.

Source: Authors compilation.

Table 6. Parent-subsidiary companies’ geographic distances, regional differences and CSR.

Variable	Eastern Region	Midwestern Regions
	(1)	(2)
GeoDis	−0.187***	−0.127**
	(−5.12)	(−2.17)
Size	0.123***	0.089*
	(3.56)	(1.65)
Age	0.449***	0.497***
	(8.82)	(6.19)
Lev	1.764***	1.962***
	(9.45)	(6.99)
Roe	0.381***	0.357***
	(4.14)	(4.57)
Tat	0.076	0.229*
	(1.18)	(1.82)
LarHol	0.022	−0.505
	(0.09)	(−1.28)
CeoDu	0.003	−0.134
	(0.04)	(−1.05)
_cons	1.983***	2.119*
	(2.68)	(1.83)
Year	YES	YES
Industry	YES	YES
N	15636	7086
R^2	0.064	0.076
Adj R^2	0.058	0.064

Notes. Robust t-statistics in parentheses. ^*** p < 0.01; ^** p < 0.05; ^* p < 0.1.

Source: Authors compilation.

Table 7. Test results of intermediary effect.

Variable	CSR
	(1)	(2)
GeoDis		−0.171***
		(−5.56)
IC	0.443**	0.425**
	(2.27)	(2.18)
Size	0.090***	0.122***
	(3.12)	(4.15)
Age	0.500***	0.470***
	(11.74)	(11.03)
Lev	1.894***	1.890***
	(12.17)	(12.15)
Roe	0.371***	0.371***
	(5.98)	(6.00)
Tat	0.103*	0.106*
	(1.79)	(1.84)
LarHol	−0.032	−0.127
	(−0.15)	(−0.61)
CeoDu	−0.032	−0.024
	(−0.50)	(−0.38)
_cons	−1.858	−0.931
	(−1.42)	(−0.71)
Year	YES	YES
Industry	YES	YES
N	22724	22724
R^2	0.054	0.055
Adj R^2	0.050	0.051

Notes. Robust t-statistics in parentheses. ^*** p < 0.01; ^** p < 0.05; ^* p < 0.1.

Source: Authors compilation.

Table 8. Robustness test: delete four municipalities.

Variable	CSR
	（1）	（2）
GeoDis	−0.163***	−0.180***
	(−4.79)	(−5.25)
Size		0.147***
		(4.30)
Age		0.480***
		(10.01)
Lev		1.826***
		(10.67)
Roe		0.426***
		(5.40)
Tat		0.151**
		(2.26)
LarHol		−0.288
		(−1.24)
CeoDu		−0.032
		(−0.46)
_cons	6.285***	1.327*
	(22.02)	(1.83)
Year	YES	YES
Industry	YES	YES
N	18286	18286
R^2	0.027	0.057
Adj R^2	0.022	0.052

Notes. Robust t-statistics in parentheses. ^*** p < 0.01; ^** p < 0.05; ^* p < 0.1.

Source: Authors compilation.