Corporate Power for Poverty Alleviation: Evidence from the Poverty Alleviation Results of Chinese Listed Companies

Government-led poverty alleviation faces multiple constraints and limitations fighting poverty, and it is urgent to mobilize social forces as many as possible, especially the involvement of corporate forces. To figure out whether corporate participation is effective to poverty alleviation and whether regional differences have an impact on it, this paper probes into results of corporate involvement in poverty alleviation, based on corporate social responsibility report information released by A-share listed companies in 2010–2017. The findings are as follows. (1) Companies in the western region, companies directly contacting consumers and large companies with good business performance are more willing to involve in poverty alleviation. (2) The participation of enterprises in poverty alleviation can increase the per capita income of rural residents, which is even better in underdeveloped areas. This revealed that social forces represented by companies have responded to China’s call of targeted poverty alleviation and fulfilled corporate social responsibilities, which will indeed help consolidate the achievements of poverty alleviation and lift underdeveloped areas out of poverty. From the perspective of corporate involvement in poverty alleviation, this paper extends related research on social forces and another participant in poverty alleviation, and enrich the literature on social benefits brought by companies performing social responsibilities.