Despite extensive efforts, the relation between tax incentives and corporate capital structure is an open question. The 2017 US tax reform creates an opportunity to directly estimate this relation. The reform limits the tax advantage of debt for all firms except for small businesses with average...

This paper provides a survey of the trade-off theory of corporate capital structure. First we provide an analysis of an equilibrium version of the theory. The firm raises debt from an investor. Debt provides interest tax shields but raises the probability of costly bankruptcy. The model provides...

Using a new measure of labor mobility instrumented by state-level shocks, I find that an increase in worker mobility negatively affects firms' average leverage and investment rates, but only in firms that rely on high-skill workers. I develop a dynamic model that provides an economic mechanism...

We examine how changes in property rights security impact firm capital structure decisions by exploiting a natural experiment, the enactment of China's Property Rights Law in 2007 (the Law). Using a large dataset of non-listed firms, we document a significant overall decrease in leverage after...