Corporate Culture

How Corporate Purpose Affects Firms

A company’s purpose is a core aspect of the organization: it influences the financial performance of company, and relates to its ownership...

Wirecard Scandal: When All Lines of Defense Against Corporate Fraud Fail

Scandals such as Wirecard can destroy investor trust in capital markets working fairly and with integrity. A new policy brief commissioned by...

Serving Shareholders Doesn’t Mean Putting Profit Above All Else

The time has come for companies, economists, and society to abandon the argument that the only responsibility of business is to maximize profits. Editor’s note:...

Elon Musk Wants to Get Paid. He Will Get His 2019 Bonus Thanks to an Accounting Magic

In March 2018, Tesla’s Board of Directors granted Musk a potential bonus of 20,264,042 stock option awards under a  plan that uses “adjusted EBITDA” as one...

The Uber Bubble: Why Is a Company That Lost $20 Billion Claimed to Be Successful?

In the first of three interrelated articles, transportation consultant Hubert Horan discusses Uber's "uncompetitive economics." There is no real innovation in the company's business...

The SEC's Proposal on Proxy Advisor Regulation Shields CEOs From Accountability to Investors

SEC Commissioner Robert Jackson dissented from his SEC colleagues' proposal on how to reform proxy advisors regulation. New rules, he argues, would introduce a...

New Empirical Studies Show: When It Comes to Productivity, Management Matters

Research has shown that studying the causes and implications of management across organizations can be of much benefit to economics. It is well documented((This piece...

Making Your Vote Count: Does the Voting Behavior of Asset Managers Truly Reflect Their Clients’ Interests?

In the past five years, thanks to growing public pressure, there has been increased attention on the voting behavior of asset managers. As a...

Is Lionizing CEOs Dangerous for Society?

In an interview with ProMarket, Open University's Peter Bloom talks about his provocative new book CEO Society and why he believes celebrating corporate CEOs...

Do We Need to Mandate Firms’ Reporting And Auditing?

Back in the 1960s, George Stigler called into question whether states should require firms to publicly report their financials. A recent Stigler Center working...

LATEST NEWS

The Convoluted Regulatory Regime for M&A Assessments in the US

What happens when the goals of antitrust enforcers clash with regulators focused on issues of national security and public interest? A forthcoming book by Ioannis Kokkoris, Public Interest Considerations in US Merger Control, explores these tensions in the United States regulatory framework.

Was Microsoft’s “Polluted Java” a presumptively legal improved product design?

Section 2 defendants often interpret the holdings of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in U.S. v...

Income Inequality May Worsen the Spread of Infectious Disease

Income inequality may exacerbate the spread of infectious diseases. In a new paper, Jay Bhattacharya, Joydeep Bhattacharya, and Min Kyong Kim examine the relationship between income inequality and the incidence and prevalence of tuberculosis across countries.

The Classic Theory of Albert O. Hirschman Argues Against the US Chamber’s Case for Non-Competes

Drawing on the theory of Albert O. Hirschman’s  Exit, Voice, and Loyalty, Brian Callaci argues non-compete clauses stifle the important channels of communication between employees and businesses necessary for improving firm competitiveness. The evidence also shows that, despite claims from businesses, non-competes harm rather than reward employees for their loyalty. 

AI For the Antitrust Regulator

Cary Coglianese lays out the potential, and the considerations, for antitrust regulators to use machine learning and artificial intelligence algorithms.