When stakeholder protection is left to the voluntary initiative of managers, relations with social activists may become an effective entrenchment strategy for inefficient CEOs. We thus argue that managerial turnover and firm value are increased by the institutionalization of stakeholder...

We study the extent to which a firm’s social capital, as measured by the intensity of a firm’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities, affects firm performance during the 2008-2009 financial crisis. We find that high-CSR firms have crisis-period stock returns that are four to five...

We study the relationship between employee satisfaction and abnormal stock returns around the world, using lists of the “Best Companies to Work For” in 14 countries. We show that employee satisfaction is associated with positive abnormal returns in countries with high labor market...

This paper presents an industry equilibrium model where firms can choose to engage in corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities. We model CSR activities as an investment in customer loyalty and show that CSR decreases systematic risk and increases firm value. These effects are stronger...

Researchers debate whether environmental investments reduce firm value or can actually improve financial performance. We provide some first evidence on shareholder wealth effects of voluntary corporate environmental initiatives. Companies announcing membership in Climate Leaders and Ceres - two...

Extensive research has demonstrated the existence of large potential welfare gains from trade facilitation—measures to reduce the overall costs of the international movement of goods. From an equity perspective an important question is how those benefits are distributed across and within...

This paper presents the trade-in-tasks conceptual framework and extends it to consider a setting where offshoring occurs between high wage nations and where agglomeration forces are important. It also considers the policy implications ranging from rules of origin and trade facilitation to...

Some observers argue that increased real integration has led to greater co-movement of prices internationally. We examine the evidence for cross-border price spillovers among economies participating in the pan-Asian cross-border production networks. Starting with country-level data, we find that...

This paper analyses theoretically and empirically the relationship between trade and war. We show that the intuition that trade promotes peace is only partially true even in a model where trade is beneficial to all, war reduces trade and leaders take into account the costs of war. When war can...