This paper presents theoretical analysis of how career concerns and shareholder monitoring affect chief executive officer (CEO) agency costs. We investigate investment efficiency prior to CEO retirement based on a sample of Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) during the 1999-2007 period and...

Understanding CEO compensation plans is a continuing challenge for directors and investors. The disclosure of these plans is dictated by SEC rules that rely heavily on the “fair value” of awards at the time they are granted. The problem with these numbers is that they are static and do not...

This paper examines the reliance on ESG metrics in executive compensation contracts. In our sample of international publicly traded firms, a rapidly growing fraction incorporate ESG metrics in the compensation schemes of their top executives. Our analysis links the reliance on these metrics to...

This paper illustrates why some firms hire compensation consultants while others do not, and the implications for CEO compensation. We consider a matching model of firms and CEOs, in which firms are governed by effective boards that act on behalf of shareholders, non-conflicting consultants...

Whether executive compensation practices reflect optimal contracting or managerial power is one of the most fundamental and controversial topics in compensation and governance research. We shed light on this central issue by being the first to study the role of independent directors in adjusting...

We examine the selection of peer groups that boards of directors use when setting CEO compensation. The challenge is to ascertain whether peer groups are selected to (i) attract and retain executive talent and/or (ii) enable rent extraction by inappropriately increasing compensation. We find...

The literature on shareholder voting has mostly focused on the influence of proxy advisors on shareholder votes. We exploit a unique empirical setting enabling us to provide a direct estimate of management's influence. Analyzing shareholder votes on the frequency of future say on pay votes, we...

We examine the effect of say on pay regulation in the United Kingdom (UK). Consistent with the view that shareholders regard say on pay as a value-creating mechanism, the regulation's announcement triggered a positive stock price reaction at firms with weak penalties for poor performance. UK...

Using the most recent data available, I examine the influence of large shareholders and institutional investors on different components of CEO compensation. Increased large shareholder ownership reduces total pay and current elements of incentive compensation, i.e. option, stock, and bonus pay,...

A vast literature in the field of public organizations has analyzed several factors of the compensation of government senior managers. However, the institutional factors associated with high levels of compensation of public managers are hardly known. In particular, studies about the possible...