We use the history of private limited liability companies (PLLCs) to challenge two pervasive assumptions in the literature: (1) Anglo-American legal institutions were better for economic development than continental Europe’s civil-law institutions; and (2) the corporation was the superior form of business organization. Data on the number and types of firms organized in France, Germany, the UK, and the US show that that the PLLC became the form of choice for small- and medium-size enterprises wherever and whenever it was introduced. The PLLC’s key advantage was its flexible internal governance rules that allowed its users to limit the threat of untimely dissolution inherent in partnerships without taking on the full danger of minority oppression that the corporation entailed. The PLLC was first successfully introduced in Germany, a code country, in 1892. Great Britain, a common-law country followed in 1907, and France, a code country, in 1925. The laggard was the US, a common-law country whose courts had effectively killed earlier attempts to enact the form.
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Paper provided by Economic Growth Center, Yale University in its series Working Papers with number
959.
Find related papers by JEL classification: N8 - Economic History - - Micro-Business History G3 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance O16 - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Financial Markets; Saving and Capital Investment K22 - Law and Economics - - Regulation and Business Law - - - Corporation and Securities Law
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