Do mergers reduce corporate investment? Evidence from United Kingdom experience
研究并购对英国企业新投资的影响，发现并购可能挤占资本投资，对经济政策有重要启示。
A number of advanced capitalist countries have experienced an intense and historically unprecedented wave of mergers during the last two decades. Not surprisingly, this has led to a considerable amount of literature on analysing the causes and effects of mergers (for a recent survey of this research see Mueller, 1930). As far as the effects of mergers on economic activity are concerned, an important area of increasing concern—particu-larly in the context of the slow growth of UK industrial economy—has been the impact of mergers on new investment. Speaking recently in the House of Lords on the decline of UK industry, Lord Kaldor observed: The managers of our businesses have been engaged in a continuous struggle cither in averting certain takeover bids or in putting themselves into a position to be taken over on favourable terms, or else in the position to take over other firms—a game which requires clever accountants who can show the best-looking profit and loss accounts... The gains from successful takeover bids are far more rewarding to owners and controllers of firms than the profits derived from developing new lines or new markets, all of which are by their nature slow and long-term operations, but which in contrast to the short-term financial gains, are in the national interest (Kaldor, 1981). Lord Kaldor's concern has been echoed by other economists. For example Dennis Mueller (1977), discussing the impact of mergers in the United States has strongly argued that they compete directly with capital investment, research and development and other investment type of expenditure. Other American investigators have main-tained also that mergers have an adverse effect on new investment (e.g. Reid, 1968; Sichel, 1970). There has been, however, scant empirical evidence having a direct bearing on this issue. The aim of this paper is to fill this gap by examining a number of questions regarding the impact of mergers on new investment. Detailed evidence for the United Kingdom is examined, and an attempt is made to isolate the effects on new investment. The results obtained are shown to have potentially important implications for economic policy issues which have been discussed in the UK in recent years.1