中文摘要：

薪酬差距是既有正向激励作用又有负面影响效果的一把“双刃剑”。本文基于“锦标赛”及“行为”两种竞争性激励理论构建了分析薪酬差距和企业绩效两者关系的理论框架，利用中国制造业348家上市公司2004-2013年的平衡面板数据，使用门限面板模型考察了内部薪酬差距对企业绩效的非对称激励效应，之后通过检验不同程度的薪酬差距对高管和普通员工的激励后果对这种非对称性效应的内在机理进行解释。研究发现，内部薪酬差距与企业绩效间存在倒U型关系，且正向激励效应随着差距的变化而有所差异，即具有显著的门限特征。当内部薪酬差距小于临界值（5.978）时，对绩效产生更强的激励效应，且企业的投资效率和全要素生产率显著增加。上述经验证据表明，超过临界值的内部薪酬差距减缓企业绩效升高且弱化对职工的正向激励作用的状况已出现在中国部分上市公司。本文认为由于薪酬差距的激励作用具有边际递减效应，确定企业内部薪酬差距的临界值以优化其经济激励效果在企业薪酬管理中显得日益重要。

英文摘要：

The pay dispersion is a double-edged sword, there are both positive incentive effect and negative effect. Based on two competitive incentive theory--＂tournament＂ and ＂behavior＂, this paper builds the theoretical framework of the relationship between internal pay dispersion and firm performance and then takes advantage of China＇s 348 manufacturing listed companies＇ balanced panel data from 2004 to 2013, the threshold panel model method is used to examine the asymmetric incentive effects of internal pay dispersion on firm performance, and then based on the incentive effect perspective of internal pay dispersionon executives and ordinary employees to interpret the internal mechanism of the asymmetry. The study found that the internal pay dispersion exists inverted U-shaped relationship with the firm performance, and the positive incentive effect is different, which has significant threshold characteristic. When the internal pay dispersion is smaller than the critical value （5.978）, there are stronger incentive effects on performance, and the firm＇s investment efficiency and total factor productivity both increase significantly. The empirical evidences show that the internal pay dispersion which is more than the critical value not only slow down firm performance but also weaken the positive incentive to the worker which exist in some listed companies in China. This paper argues that according to the diminishing marginal effect of incentive pay dispersion, determine the critical value of internal pay dispersion to improve its incentive effect is becoming increasingly important in enterprise salary management.