The serious implications of privatizing state-owned enterprises for politicians, managers, and investors make such decisions highly contingent on firm characteristics and past performance, complicating the identification of the privatization effects. A unique opportunity for this identification...

"Two main career paths are prevalent among politicians in modern democracies: there are career politicians (i.e., politicians who work in the political sector until retirement), and political careers (i.e., there are politicians who leave politics before retirement and work in the private...

We propose a theory that emphasizes the role of managers for the production and allocation of human capital in firms. Managers invest time to train junior employees, and acquire information about the juniors' abilities that is valuable for job assignments. This dual role of managers matters...