You might consider whether you want to use an object instead; all JavaScript objects (including Array instances) are (highly-optimized) sets of key/value pairs with an optional prototype An implementation should (note I don’t say “does”) have a reasonable performance hashing algorithm. (Update: That was in 2010. Here in 2018, objects are highly optimized on all significant JavaScript engines.)
Aside from that, the performance of splice is going to vary a lot between implementations (e.g., vendors). This is one reason why “don’t optimize prematurely” is even more appropriate advice for JavaScript applications that will run in multiple vendor implementations (web apps, for instance) than it is even for normal programming. Keep your code well modularized and address performance issues if and when they occur.