Mafia firms introduce distortions in the markets in which they operate, increasing the cost of doing business for peer firms. We investigate whether peers respond by increasing their tax avoidance and thus increasing funds available to compete with the Mafia firms. Using a sample of Italian...

We investigate the impact of peer pressure on the characteristics of forward-looking disclosures. We identify plausibly exogenous variation in the amount of peer firm forecast news available when a focal firm issues its own forecast by employing a sample of firms that issue forecasts in...

In this paper, we investigate peer effects in corporate risk management by studying reinsurance utilization in the U.S. property-casualty insurance industry due to the unique risk management feature of this industry and the statutory disclosure requirement of detailed reinsurance transactions....

We construct a peer effects model where mean expenditures of consumers in one's peer group affect utility through perceived consumption needs. We provide a novel method for obtaining identification in social interactions models like ours, using ordinary survey data, where very few members of...

Do individuals choose their reference groups, i.e. their Joneses, or are they culturally transmitted across generations? We provide evidence that feeds the theoretical debate about the endogeneity or exogeneity of reference groups. Our findings for Uruguay suggest that reference groups are...