IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/23508.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Matching of Heterogeneous Firms and Politicians

Author

Listed:
  • Chen, Maggie

Abstract

We use a Chinese firm-director level panel dataset to examine the matching of heterogeneous firms and politicians. Based on 36,308 detailed biographies, we identify individuals that previously held bureaucratic positions and classify the rank of each position in the Chinese political hierarchy. Using this direct measure of political capital, we examine how firms with heterogeneous productivity match with politicians with different political strength. Our results indicate a positive assortative matching in the political markets. More productive firms recruit more powerful politicians. Further, the preference for political capital relative to conventional human capital increases in firms' dependence on external financing and decreases in the efficiency of local governments. Conditional on the endogenous matching, new hires with greater political strength receive more compensation than their co-workers in the same cohort. The marginal effect of a one-step rise in the political ladder exceeds the marginal effect of raising education attainment from, for example, high school to college.

Suggested Citation

  • Chen, Maggie, 2009. "The Matching of Heterogeneous Firms and Politicians," MPRA Paper 23508, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:23508
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/23508/1/MPRA_paper_23508.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Johnson, Simon & Kaufmann, Daniel & McMillan, John & Woodruff, Christopher, 2000. "Why do firms hide? Bribes and unofficial activity after communism," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 495-520, June.
    2. Daniel H. Rosen, 1999. "Behind the Open Door: Foreign Enterprises in the Chinese Marketplace," Peterson Institute Press: All Books, Peterson Institute for International Economics, number 23, October.
    3. Fan, Joseph P.H. & Wong, T.J. & Zhang, Tianyu, 2007. "Politically connected CEOs, corporate governance, and Post-IPO performance of China's newly partially privatized firms," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(2), pages 330-357, May.
    4. Agrawal, Anup & Knoeber, Charles R, 2001. "Do Some Outside Directors Play a Political Role?," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 44(1), pages 179-198, April.
    5. La Porta, Rafael & Lopez-de-Silanes, Florencio & Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert, 1999. "The Quality of Government," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 15(1), pages 222-279, April.
    6. Tjalling C. Koopmans & Martin J. Beckmann, 1955. "Assignment Problems and the Location of Economic Activities," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 4, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    7. Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer & Robert W. Vishny, 1998. "Law and Finance," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(6), pages 1113-1155, December.
    8. Hongbin Li & Lingsheng Meng & Junsen Zhang, 2006. "Why Do Entrepreneurs Enter Politics? Evidence from China," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 44(3), pages 559-578, July.
    9. Jun Du & Sourafel Girma, 2007. "Red Capitalists: Political Connections and the Growth and Survival of Start-up Companies in China," Discussion Papers 07/40, University of Nottingham, GEP.
    10. Jonathan Eaton & Samuel Kortum & Francis Kramarz, 2011. "An Anatomy of International Trade: Evidence From French Firms," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(5), pages 1453-1498, September.
    11. Olley, G Steven & Pakes, Ariel, 1996. "The Dynamics of Productivity in the Telecommunications Equipment Industry," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(6), pages 1263-1297, November.
    12. Hongbin Cai & Hanming Fang & Lixin Colin Xu, 2005. "Eat, Drink, Firms and Government: An Investigation of Corruption from Entertainment and Travel Costs of Chinese Firms," NBER Working Papers 11592, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Montgomery, James D, 1991. "Social Networks and Labor-Market Outcomes: Toward an Economic Analysis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1407-1418, December.
    14. Bernard, Andrew B. & Bradford Jensen, J., 1999. "Exceptional exporter performance: cause, effect, or both?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 1-25, February.
    15. Li, Hongbin & Meng, Lingsheng & Wang, Qian & Zhou, Li-An, 2008. "Political connections, financing and firm performance: Evidence from Chinese private firms," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 283-299, October.
    16. Patrick Legros & Andrew F. Newman, 2002. "Monotone Matching in Perfect and Imperfect Worlds," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 69(4), pages 925-942.
    17. David D. Li, 1998. "Changing Incentives of the Chinese Bureaucracy," William Davidson Institute Working Papers Series 130, William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan.
    18. Liu, Zhiqiang, 2003. "The Economic Impact and Determinants of Investment in Human and Political Capital in China," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 51(4), pages 823-849, July.
    19. Beata Smarzynska Javorcik, 2004. "Does Foreign Direct Investment Increase the Productivity of Domestic Firms? In Search of Spillovers Through Backward Linkages," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(3), pages 605-627, June.
    20. Mara Faccio, 2006. "Politically Connected Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 369-386, March.
    21. Barry Naughton, 2007. "The Chinese Economy: Transitions and Growth," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262640643, December.
    22. Johnson, Simon & Mitton, Todd, 2003. "Cronyism and capital controls: evidence from Malaysia," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 351-382, February.
    23. Andrei Shleifer & Robert W. Vishny, 1994. "Politicians and Firms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 109(4), pages 995-1025.
    24. Jonathan E. Haskel & Sonia C. Pereira & Matthew J. Slaughter, 2007. "Does Inward Foreign Direct Investment Boost the Productivity of Domestic Firms?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(3), pages 482-496, August.
    25. Claessens, Stijn & Feijen, Erik & Laeven, Luc, 2008. "Political connections and preferential access to finance: The role of campaign contributions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(3), pages 554-580, June.
    26. Brandt,Loren & Rawski,Thomas G. (ed.), 2008. "China's Great Economic Transformation," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521885577.
    27. La Porta, Rafael & Lopez-de-Silanes, Florencio & Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert, 2000. "Investor protection and corporate governance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(1-2), pages 3-27.
    28. Yeaple, Stephen Ross, 2005. "A simple model of firm heterogeneity, international trade, and wages," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 1-20, January.
    29. Simon Johnson & John McMillan & Christopher Woodruff, 2002. "Property Rights and Finance," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1335-1356, December.
    30. Thomas Stratmann, 2005. "Some talk: Money in politics. A (partial) review of the literature," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 124(1), pages 135-156, July.
    31. Brandt,Loren & Rawski,Thomas G. (ed.), 2008. "China's Great Economic Transformation," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521712903.
    32. Marc J. Melitz, 2003. "The Impact of Trade on Intra-Industry Reallocations and Aggregate Industry Productivity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(6), pages 1695-1725, November.
    33. Kaivan Munshi, 2003. "Networks in the Modern Economy: Mexican Migrants in the U. S. Labor Market," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(2), pages 549-599.
    34. Li, David D, 1998. "Changing Incentives of the Chinese Bureaucracy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 393-397, May.
    35. Raymond Fisman, 2001. "Estimating the Value of Political Connections," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(4), pages 1095-1102, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Bao, Xiaolu & Johan, Sofia & Kutsuna, Kenji, 2016. "Do political connections matter in accessing capital markets? Evidence from China," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 24-41.
    2. Elise S. Brezis & Joël Cariolle, 2017. "Financial Sector Regulation and the Revolving Door in US Commercial Banks," Studies in Political Economy, in: Norman Schofield & Gonzalo Caballero (ed.), State, Institutions and Democracy, pages 53-76, Springer.
    3. Taining Wang & Jinjing Tian & Feng Yao, 2021. "Does high debt ratio influence Chinese firms’ performance? A semiparametric stochastic frontier approach with zero inefficiency," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 61(2), pages 587-636, August.
    4. Fang, Mingyue, 2014. "先天优势还是后天努力？——国企级别对全要素生产率影响的实证研究 [Innate Advantages or Hard Work? An Empirical Study on the Impacts of SOEs’ Administrative Level on Total Factor Productivity]," MPRA Paper 60439, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Elise S. Brezis & Joel Cariolle, 2014. "The Revolving Door Indicator: Estimating the Distortionary Power of the Revolving Door," Working Papers 2014-13, Bar-Ilan University, Department of Economics.
    6. He, Qing & Li, Xiaoyang & Zhu, Wenyu, 2020. "Political connection and the walking dead: Evidence from China's privately owned firms," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 1056-1070.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Li, Hongbin & Meng, Lingsheng & Wang, Qian & Zhou, Li-An, 2008. "Political connections, financing and firm performance: Evidence from Chinese private firms," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 283-299, October.
    2. Bao, Xiaolu & Johan, Sofia & Kutsuna, Kenji, 2016. "Do political connections matter in accessing capital markets? Evidence from China," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 24-41.
    3. Jun Su & Jia He, 2010. "Does Giving Lead to Getting? Evidence from Chinese Private Enterprises," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 93(1), pages 73-90, April.
    4. Banerji, Sanjay & Duygun, Meryem & Shaban, Mohamed, 2018. "Political connections, bailout in financial markets and firm value," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 388-401.
    5. Jia, Ning & Mao, Xinshu & Yuan, Rongli, 2019. "Political connections and directors' and officers' liability insurance – Evidence from China," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 353-372.
    6. Jiang, Haiyan & Hu, Yuanyuan & Zhang, Honghui & Zhou, Donghua, 2018. "Benefits of Downward Earnings Management and Political Connection: Evidence from Government Subsidy and Market Pricing," The International Journal of Accounting, Elsevier, vol. 53(4), pages 255-273.
    7. Wang, Fangjun & Xu, Luying & Zhang, Junrui & Shu, Wei, 2018. "Political connections, internal control and firm value: Evidence from China's anti-corruption campaign," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 53-67.
    8. Liu, Qigui & Tang, Jinghua & Tian, Gary Gang, 2013. "Does political capital create value in the IPO market? Evidence from China," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 395-413.
    9. Feng, Xunan & Johansson, Anders C. & Zhang, Tianyu, 2015. "Mixing business with politics: Political participation by entrepreneurs in China," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 220-235.
    10. Cull, Robert & Li, Wei & Sun, Bo & Xu, Lixin Colin, 2015. "Government connections and financial constraints: Evidence from a large representative sample of Chinese firms," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 271-294.
    11. Zhao, Hongxin & Lu, Jiangyong, 2016. "Contingent value of political capital in bank loan acquisition: Evidence from founder-controlled private enterprises in China," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 153-174.
    12. Wong, Wai-Yan & Hooy, Chee-Wooi, 2018. "Do types of political connection affect firm performance differently?," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 297-317.
    13. Haitian Lu & Hongbo Pan & Chenying Zhang, 2015. "Political Connectedness and Court Outcomes: Evidence from Chinese Corporate Lawsuits," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 58(4).
    14. Feng Liu & Hui Lin & Huiying Wu, 2018. "Political Connections and Firm Value in China: An Event Study," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 152(2), pages 551-571, October.
    15. Daeheon Choi & Chune Young Chung & Soon-Ihl Samuel Hong & Jason Young, 2020. "The Role of Political Collusion in Corporate Performance in the Korean Market," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-18, March.
    16. Barraza, Santiago & Rossi, Martín A & Ruzzier, Christian A, 2022. "Sleeping with the enemy: The perils of having the government on(the)board," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 641-651.
    17. Tang, Xuesong & Lin, Yan & Peng, Qing & Du, Jun & Chan, Kam C., 2016. "Politically connected directors and firm value: Evidence from forced resignations in China," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 148-167.
    18. Zengji Song & Abraham Nahm & Zongyi Zhang, 2015. "The value of partial state ownership in publicly listed private sector enterprises: evidence from China," Post-Communist Economies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 27(3), pages 336-353, September.
    19. He, Lerong & Wan, Hong & Zhou, Xin, 2014. "How are political connections valued in China? Evidence from market reaction to CEO succession," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 141-152.
    20. Feng, Xunan & Johansson, Anders C. & Zhang, Tianyu, 2014. "Political participation and entrepreneurial initial public offerings in China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(2), pages 269-285.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    firm heterogeneity; politician; political hierarchy; matching;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D73 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Bureaucracy; Administrative Processes in Public Organizations; Corruption
    • D21 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Theory
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • O12 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:23508. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc 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 RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.