IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/
MyIDEAS: Log in (now much improved!) to save this article

Employee treatment and firm leverage: A test of the stakeholder theory of capital structure

Author Info

Listed author(s):
  • Bae, Kee-Hong
  • Kang, Jun-Koo
  • Wang, Jin
Registered author(s):

    Abstract

    We investigate the stakeholder theory of capital structure from the perspective of a firm's relations with its employees. We find that firms that treat their employees fairly (as measured by high employee[hyphen (true graphic)]friendly ratings) maintain low debt ratios. This result is robust to a variety of model specifications and endogeneity issues. The negative relation between leverage and a firm's ability to treat employees fairly is also evident when we measure its ability by whether it is included in the Fortune magazine list, "100 Best Companies to Work For." These results suggest that a firm's incentive or ability to offer fair employee treatment is an important determinant of its financing policy.

    Download Info

    If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304-405X(10)00255-2
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.

    Article provided by Elsevier in its journal Journal of Financial Economics.

    Volume (Year): 100 (2011)
    Issue (Month): 1 (April)
    Pages: 130-153

    as
    in new window

    Handle: RePEc:eee:jfinec:v:100:y:2011:i:1:p:130-153
    Contact details of provider: Web page: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505576

    Keywords: Capital structure Employee treatment Stakeholder KLD rating Endogeneity;

    References listed on IDEAS
    Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:

    as
    in new window


    1. MacKie-Mason, Jeffrey K, 1990. " Do Taxes Affect Corporate Financing Decisions?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 45(5), pages 1471-1493, December.
    2. Stewart C. Myers & Nicholas S. Majluf, 1984. "Corporate Financing and Investment Decisions When Firms Have InformationThat Investors Do Not Have," NBER Working Papers 1396, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Huang, Rongbing & Ritter, Jay R., 2009. "Testing Theories of Capital Structure and Estimating the Speed of Adjustment," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(02), pages 237-271, April.
    4. Myers, Stewart C. & Majluf, Nicholas S., 1984. "Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 187-221, June.
    5. A. Smith, Jeffrey & E. Todd, Petra, 2005. "Does matching overcome LaLonde's critique of nonexperimental estimators?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 125(1-2), pages 305-353.
    6. Arellano, Manuel & Bover, Olympia, 1995. "Another look at the instrumental variable estimation of error-components models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 29-51, July.
    7. James J. Heckman & Hidehiko Ichimura & Petra E. Todd, 1997. "Matching As An Econometric Evaluation Estimator: Evidence from Evaluating a Job Training Programme," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 64(4), pages 605-654.
    8. Murray Z. Frank & Vidhan K. Goyal, 2009. "Capital Structure Decisions: Which Factors Are Reliably Important?," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 38(1), pages 1-37, 03.
    9. Lee, Peggy M. & Wahal, Sunil, 2004. "Grandstanding, certification and the underpricing of venture capital backed IPOs," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 375-407, August.
    10. Augustin Landier & Vinay B. Nair & Julie Wulf, 2009. "Trade-offs in Staying Close: Corporate Decision Making and Geographic Dispersion," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(3), pages 1119-1148, March.
    11. Eugene F. Fama, 2002. "Testing Trade-Off and Pecking Order Predictions About Dividends and Debt," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 15(1), pages 1-33, March.
    12. Berger, Philip G & Ofek, Eli & Yermack, David L, 1997. " Managerial Entrenchment and Capital Structure Decisions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(4), pages 1411-1438, September.
    13. Faleye, Olubunmi & Mehrotra, Vikas & Morck, Randall, 2006. "When Labor Has a Voice in Corporate Governance," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 41(03), pages 489-510, September.
    14. Jeffrey M Wooldridge, 2010. "Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 2, volume 1, number 0262232588.
    15. Flannery, Mark J. & Rangan, Kasturi P., 2006. "Partial adjustment toward target capital structures," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(3), pages 469-506, March.
    16. David R. Graham & Daniel P. Kaplan & David S. Sibley, 1983. "Efficiency and Competition in the Airline Industry," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 14(1), pages 118-138, Spring.
    17. Perotti, Enrico C & Spier, Kathryn E, 1993. "Capital Structure as a Bargaining Tool: The Role of Leverage in Contract Renegotiation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(5), pages 1131-1141, December.
    18. Xin Chang & Sudipto Dasgupta, 2009. "Target Behavior and Financing: How Conclusive Is the Evidence?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(4), pages 1767-1796, 08.
    19. Jensen, Michael C, 1986. "Agency Costs of Free Cash Flow, Corporate Finance, and Takeovers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(2), pages 323-329, May.
    20. John R. Graham & Mark H. Lang & Douglas A. Shackelford, 2004. "Employee Stock Options, Corporate Taxes, and Debt Policy," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 59(4), pages 1585-1618, 08.
    21. Rajan, Raghuram G & Zingales, Luigi, 1995. " What Do We Know about Capital Structure? Some Evidence from International Data," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(5), pages 1421-1460, December.
    22. Frank, Murray Z. & Goyal, Vidhan K., 2003. "Testing the pecking order theory of capital structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 217-248, February.
    23. Jonathan B. Berk & Richard Stanton & Josef Zechner, 2010. "Human Capital, Bankruptcy, and Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(3), pages 891-926, 06.
    24. Antoniou, Antonios & Guney, Yilmaz & Paudyal, Krishna, 2008. "The Determinants of Capital Structure: Capital Market-Oriented versus Bank-Oriented Institutions," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 43(01), pages 59-92, March.
    25. Graham, John R., 1996. "Debt and the marginal tax rate," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 41-73, May.
    26. Mark T. Leary & Michael R. Roberts, 2005. "Do Firms Rebalance Their Capital Structures?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(6), pages 2575-2619, December.
    27. Bergman, Nittai K. & Jenter, Dirk, 2007. "Employee sentiment and stock option compensation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(3), pages 667-712, June.
    28. Myers, Stewart C., 1977. "Determinants of corporate borrowing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 147-175, November.
    29. Myers, Stewart C. & Majluf, Nicolás S., 1945-, 1984. "Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have," Working papers 1523-84., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management.
    30. Titman, Sheridan & Wessels, Roberto, 1988. " The Determinants of Capital Structure Choice," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 43(1), pages 1-19, March.
    31. Nickell, Stephen J, 1996. "Competition and Corporate Performance," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 104(4), pages 724-746, August.
    32. Stephen G. Bronars & Donald R. Deere, 1991. "The Threat of Unionization, the Use of Debt, and the Preservation of Shareholder Wealth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 106(1), pages 231-254.
    33. Klasa, Sandy & Maxwell, William F. & Ortiz-Molina, Hernán, 2009. "The strategic use of corporate cash holdings in collective bargaining with labor unions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(3), pages 421-442, June.
    34. Verwijmeren, Patrick & Derwall, Jeroen, 2010. "Employee well-being, firm leverage, and bankruptcy risk," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(5), pages 956-964, May.
    35. James J. Heckman & Hidehiko Ichimura & Petra Todd, 1998. "Matching As An Econometric Evaluation Estimator," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 65(2), pages 261-294.
    36. Jaggia, Priscilla Butt & Thakor, Anjan V, 1994. "Firm-Specific Human Capital and Optimal Capital Structure," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 35(2), pages 283-308, May.
    37. Dasgupta, Sudipto & Sengupta, Kunal, 1993. "Sunk Investment, Bargaining and Choice of Capital Structure," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 34(1), pages 203-220, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.

    as
    in new window


    Cited by:
    This item has more than 25 citations. To prevent cluttering this page, these citations are listed on a separate page.

    This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

    Access and download statistics

    When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jfinec:v:100:y:2011:i:1:p:130-153. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Dana Niculescu)

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

    If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    This information is provided to you by IDEAS at the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis using RePEc data.