Using a detailed data set of employee stock option grants, we compare observed stock-option-based pay plans to hypothetical cash-only or restricted-stock-based plans. We make a variety of assumptions regarding the possible benefits of options relative to cash or stock, and then use observed...

Many firms issue stock options to all employees. We consider three potential economic justifications for this practice: providing incentives to employees, inducing employees to sort, and helping firms retain employees. We gather data on firms' stock option grants to middle managers from three...

Firms often pay individuals for group-level, industry-level, or even economy-wide performance even though agency theory suggests these contracts provide minimal incentive and lead to inefficient risk bearing. This paper derives a simple model that illustrates why firms might choose to implement...

We analyze the differences between companies owned by private equity (PE) investors and similar public companies. We document that PE-owned companies use much stronger incentives for their top executives and have substantially higher debt levels. However, we find little evidence that PE-owned...

New graduates of elite MBA programs flock to Wall Street during bull markets and start their careers elsewhere when the stock market is weak. Given the transferability of MBA skills, it seems likely that any effect of stock returns on MBA placement would be short-lived. In this paper, I use a...

We analyze changes in the composition of top management teams when a key member of the team (the chief executive officer [CEO]) departs. We find that the probability of non-CEO top manager turnover increases markedly around times of CEO turnover. Further, the magnitude of this increase depends...

Is executive compensation influenced by the composition of the board of directors? About 8% of chief executive officers (CEOs) are reciprocally interlocked with another CEO--the current CEO of firm A serves as a director of firm B and the current CEO of firm B serves as a director of firm A....

Using the ExecuComp data set, which contains information on the five highest-paid executives in each of a large number of U.S. firms for the years 1992–97, the authors examine the gender compensation gap among high-level executives. Women, who represented about 2.5% of the sample, earned...

This examination of the Stock Market's responsiveness to strikes looks specifically at strike actions that labor historians generally view as the major ones occurring in the United States in the years 1925–37. The authors find that strikes had large, negative effects on industry stock...