This paper investigates whether gubernatorial elections affect state governments’ accounting choices. We identify two accounts, the compensated absence liability account and the unfunded pension liability account, which provide incumbent gubernatorial candidates with flexibility for...

Although balanced budgets are widely used throughout the world, there is considerable debate on whether they are effective. Poterba (1997) provides two theories on the effectiveness of balanced budget restrictions. The institutional irrelevance view suggests that balanced budget rules are...

We ask whether credit rating agencies receive higher fees and gain greater market share when they provide more favorable ratings. To investigate this question we use the 2010 rating scale recalibration by Moody's and Fitch, which increased ratings absent any underlying change in issuer credit...

We find a negative association between a state’s fiscal condition and the use of discretion in applying Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) rules to understate pension funding gaps. We also find that the use of discretion is negatively associated with states’ decisions to increase...

We ask whether credit rating agencies receive higher fees and gain greater market share when they provide more favorable ratings. To investigate this question, we use the 2010 rating scale recalibration by Moody's and Fitch, which increased ratings absent any underlying change in issuer credit...

Finance researchers have established a strict timeline in the relationship between previous returns and future returns. Over a short-term period-generally defined as shorter than three months-there exists a reversal effect by which stocks that exhibited positive (negative) returns in the past...

The Securities and Exchange Commission has mandated the phase-in of an interactive data format termed XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language). Given that successful mapping of financial statement line items to the XBRL taxonomy is critical to the accuracy of the instance document, it is...