In the large literature on firm performance, economists have given little attention to entrepreneurs. We use deaths of more than 500 entrepreneurs as a source of exogenous variation, and ask whether this variation can explain shifts in firm performance. Using longitudinal data, we find large and...

We discuss the literatures on behavioral economics, bounded rationality and experimental economics as they apply to firm behaviour in markets. Topics discussed include the impact of imitative and satisficing behavior by firms, outcomes when managers care about their position relative to peers,...

This paper examines the consequences of creating a fully competitive market in a sector previously dominated by a cost-minimising public firm. Workers in the economy are heterogeneous in their motivation to work in the sector. In line with empirical findings, our model implies that firms in the...

This paper uses a proportional hazard model to study foreign direct investment by Japanese manufacturers in Europe between 1970 and 1994. We divide each firm’s investment total into a sequence of individual investment decisions and analyze how firm-specific characteristics affect each...

The last decade has seen a growing interest among economists on the effect of diversity on the provision of social goods and the stock of social capital. Indeed, in the workplace, cooperation, trust, and other social goods may be important elements of the smooth functioning of an office, but...

This paper asks whether adversity spurs the introduction of process innovations and increases the use of managerial incentives by firms. Using a large panel data set of workplaces in Canada, our identification strategy relies on exogenous variation in adversity arising from increased border...

We present a model to test the null hypothesis that firms organize their corporate governancearrangements optimally given the constraints they face. Following the literature, the modelrejects the null if the conditional correlation between governance and performance issignificantly different...

We reveal motivations of Chinese firms for issuing Seasoned Equity Offerings (SEO) by examining why firms change the use of SEO proceeds and how they use unspecified SEO proceeds. Using 533 SEOs issued by Chinese firms during 1999-2006, we find that firms do not use unspecified SEO proceeds on...