use Benchmark;

my @big_array = (1 .. 10000);

sub ret_array { return @big_array; }

sub ret_ref { return \@big_array; }

timethese(10000, {
                  'return_array' => sub { my @array = ret_array(); },
                  'return_ref'   => sub { my $array_ref = ret_ref(); }
                });