The debate about the compensation of executives and directors is a discussion about incentives and agency costs. This article analyzes basic tools to reduce agency costs and also assesses the ongoing debate about the future regulation of the compensation of executives and directors. It draws...

The corporate governance debate has focused recently on executive compensation. While defenders of the status quo assert that CEO compensation - and corporate governance generally - is efficient, critics contend that boards have been captured by powerful CEOs who demand excessive pay...

Many companies in Germany must provide information beyond financial figures in their annual reports. For some years now, legislators have increasingly required information on non-financial aspects, such as the shares of women in leadership positions. Using a quantitative text analysis of annual...

We investigate the relationship of CEOs' political preferences (as reflected in their political contributions) with the prevalence and compensation of women in leadership positions at U.S. public companies. We find that CEOs who favor the Democratic Party (“Democratic CEOs”) are associated...

I develop measures of firm-level pay disparity and examine their relation to firm performance. Using comprehensive compensation data for a large sample of firms, I find no statistically significant relation between the ratio of CEO-to-mean employee compensation and performance. I next create...

Elements of corporate governance must be activated at all scales for the efficient functioning of a nation‘s capital market. The effectiveness of the board of directors depends on factors related to, for example, the composition of the board and its independence. This study aims to investigate...

The hottest topic in corporate governance circles today involves company commitments to and pursuit of ESG (environmental, social, and governance) initiatives in addition to the traditional pursuit of profits. One facet of this debate has to do with how to motivate executives to pursue ESG...