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Incentives for innovation and centralized versus delegated capital budgeting

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  • Dutta, Sunil
  • Fan, Qintao

Abstract

We study a setting wherein a divisional manager undertakes personally costly effort to improve the profitability of an investment project. The manager's choice of innovation effort is subject to a holdup problem because of the ex post opportunism on the part of headquarters. We analyze and contrast the performance of centralized and delegated forms of investment decision-making. We find that delegation improves the manager's innovation incentives. We identify conditions for each of the two organizational forms to emerge as the optimal choice, and relate these conditions to characteristics of firms' investment opportunity sets.

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  • Dutta, Sunil & Fan, Qintao, 2012. "Incentives for innovation and centralized versus delegated capital budgeting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(3), pages 592-611.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jaecon:v:53:y:2012:i:3:p:592-611
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jacceco.2012.01.003
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    Cited by:

    1. Oliver Dürr & Markus Nisch & Anna Rohlfing-Bastian, 2020. "Incentives in optimally sized teams for projects with uncertain returns," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 25(1), pages 313-341, March.
    2. Dongmin Kong & Ling Zhu & Ni Qin, 2022. "Does corruption shape firm centralisation? Evidence from state‐owned enterprises in China," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 62(3), pages 3365-3395, September.
    3. Ostermaier, Andreas, 2016. "Reciprocity and honesty in capital budgeting: Positive spill-over effects of reporting," VfS Annual Conference 2016 (Augsburg): Demographic Change 145904, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    4. Lóránth, Gyöngyi & Morrison, Alan & Laux, Christian, 2016. "The Adverse Effect of Information on Governance and Leverage," CEPR Discussion Papers 11345, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Zhang, Wenzhe & Liu, Guangqiang, 2023. "Digitalization and firm centralization: A quasi-natural experiment based on the “Broadband China” policy," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).
    6. Christian Laux & Gyöngyi Lóránth & Alan D. Morrison, 2018. "The Adverse Effect of Information on Governance and Leverage," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(4), pages 1510-1527, April.
    7. Qintao Fan & Wei Li, 2018. "Leading indicator variables and managerial incentives in a dynamic agency setting," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 23(4), pages 1715-1753, December.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Capital budgeting; Centralization; Delegation; Innovation; Holdup problem;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • G34 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Mergers; Acquisitions; Restructuring; Corporate Governance
    • G31 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Capital Budgeting; Fixed Investment and Inventory Studies
    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill
    • L22 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Firm Organization and Market Structure

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