In this study, we examine the impact of top management pay and relative pay (manager pay divided by average worker pay) on a firm's productivity. We use data from China, which is an interesting setting for our research as it is transitioning from a centrally planned economy with professed egalitarian pay to a free market system, albeit with socialist characteristics. We find that top management pay is positively associated with high productivity while relative pay is negatively associated. Our results provide support for the view that workers are alienated when their incomes are far lower than that of top management and this leads to lower productivity. This effect is most pronounced in labor intensive firms. We also find some evidence that the negative impact of relative pay on a firm's productivity is reduced in private controlled listed firms.

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With the accelerated evolution of the digital transformation of economic activities, the digitalization of the different parts of the value chain, such as manufacturing, marketing, and management, has increased significantly, thereby changing the form of organizational production management while affecting how corporate social responsibility (CSR) is achieved. Therefore, in this study, we examined the relationship between the digital transformation of value chains and CSR performance and the moderating role of property ownership and market dependence. The results show that the digital transformation of value chains can improve CSR performance. When the three types of digital transformation are conducted at the same time, compared with digital manufacturing transformation and digital marketing transformation, digital management transformation has a greater impact on CSR performance. Non-state-owned enterprises and enterprises with higher market dependency show greater improvement in their CSR performance than state-owned enterprises and enterprises with lower market dependency as a result of the digital transformation of value chains. Furthermore, we found a certain degree of value mismatch between the digital transformation of the different value chain links of enterprises and the different dimensions of social responsibility. Specifically, the digital transformations of manufacturing, marketing, and management activities only exert a significant impact on shareholder responsibility, public responsibility, and shareholder and employee responsibility, respectively. This result indicates that the digital transformation of the entire value chain needs to be further optimized and integrated to achieve social responsibility values that match the value chain. This study not only helps enterprises identify the shortcomings in the digital transformation of the value chain but also provides development ideas for enterprises to realize the two-wheel drive of business value and social value through the digital transformation of the whole value chain.

Loan guarantees to related parties by affiliated subsidiaries within family controlled pyramids form a means by which the controlling family expropriates value from minority shareholders. The controlling family, however, will attempt to escape blame for the behavior. Using a sample of 1785 listed Chinese firms affiliated with family-controlled business groups, we explore how family governance structure affects the use of related party loan guarantees. As hypothesized, we find that affiliates with non-family chairmen, but with family directors or senior executives, issue larger volumes of loan guarantees to related parties, whereas affiliates with family chairmen and those with non-family interlocking chairmen do not. The behavior is moderated by regional institutional development.

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