This paper examines CEO behavior in response to within-firm pay inequality. Using CEO-median employee pay ratio data mandated by the SEC, the study reveals that following the release of pay ratio disclosures, CEOs with higher pay ratios tend to issue higher dividend payments as a strategy to...

Over the period 2005 through 2015, we find that director compensation in Chinese listed firms is influenced by both director characteristics and ownership structure. We measure director compensation by both the propensity to be paid and the level of compensation. For independent directors, we...

Greater gender diversity on bank board of directors is associated with higher compensation inequality because CEOs at these banks have higher base salary. This effect disappears during the financial crisis, largely due to adjustment of non-salary compensation

This paper examines the effects of board affiliation on the corporate pay gap. Using a sample of Chinese listed firms from 2005 to 2011, we find that boards with a greater presence of directors appointed by block shareholders have lower pay gaps. Furthermore, the governance effects of board...

We examine whether managerial social capital, defined as aggregate benefits of social obligations and informal contacts accrued through social connections, influences gender pay gaps. Consistent with homophily, the tendency to bond and interact with others of similar type, we find a positive...

Studies document an unexplained wage gap between male and female workers even as female workers have increased their human capital through skill and education. At the executive level, where skill and education are similar, the results on gender-based pay gap persist and are primarily attributed...

This paper shows that some managers systematically pay higher wages to rank-and-file workers and these managers are targets of M&As. We use a manager-firm-worker matched dataset covering the entire population of Denmark from 1995 to 2011, and develop a novel framework to identify manager fixed...

We employ a cross-country sample to examine whether cultural differences help explain gender compensation variations across corporate executives. The results show that the cultural differences, which are embedded in societies from long prior to the compensation decisions, provide significant...

Based on a unique arrangement of trading and disclosure times around earnings announcements in the Chinese stock market, we provide evidence of a striking overnight-intraday disparity in terms of the reaction to earnings news. Specifically, we find that the overnight period exhibits a strong and...