IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/finana/v95y2024ipbs1057521924004010.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Labor investment inefficiency and LGBTQ+-friendliness

Author

Listed:
  • Schopohl, Lisa
  • Urquhart, Andrew
  • Zhang, Hanxiong

Abstract

We study the effect of firms' LGBTQ+ friendliness on their labor investment efficiency and find that an improvement in firms' LGBTQ+ friendliness leads to greater labor investment inefficiencies, and that more LGBTQ+ friendly firms tend to underinvest in labor. However, we show that this relationship diminishes over time as societal and legal support for LGBTQ+ equal rights increases. A variety of firm and societal characteristics moderate the negative link between corporate LGBTQ+ friendliness and labor investment efficiency.

Suggested Citation

  • Schopohl, Lisa & Urquhart, Andrew & Zhang, Hanxiong, 2024. "Labor investment inefficiency and LGBTQ+-friendliness," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 95(PB).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:finana:v:95:y:2024:i:pb:s1057521924004010
    DOI: 10.1016/j.irfa.2024.103469
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1057521924004010
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.irfa.2024.103469?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jeff L. McMullin & Bryce Schonberger, 2020. "Entropy-balanced accruals," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 25(1), pages 84-119, March.
    2. Biddle, Gary C. & Hilary, Gilles & Verdi, Rodrigo S., 2009. "How does financial reporting quality relate to investment efficiency?," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(2-3), pages 112-131, December.
    3. Jean Kabongo & Kiyoung Chang & Ying Li, 2013. "The Impact of Operational Diversity on Corporate Philanthropy: An Empirical Study of U.S. Companies," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 116(1), pages 49-65, August.
    4. Marianne Bertrand & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2003. "Enjoying the Quiet Life? Corporate Governance and Managerial Preferences," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 111(5), pages 1043-1075, October.
    5. Jessie Y. Zhu & Wally Smieliauskas, 2022. "Evidence on the Economic Consequences of Marriage Equality and LGBT Human Rights," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 178(1), pages 57-70, June.
    6. Ee, Mong Shan & Hasan, Iftekhar & Huang, He, 2022. "Stock liquidity and corporate labor investment," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    7. Hainmueller, Jens, 2012. "Entropy Balancing for Causal Effects: A Multivariate Reweighting Method to Produce Balanced Samples in Observational Studies," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(1), pages 25-46, January.
    8. Olga Hawn & Ioannis Ioannou, 2016. "Mind the gap: The interplay between external and internal actions in the case of corporate social responsibility," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(13), pages 2569-2588, December.
    9. Stellner, Christoph & Klein, Christian & Zwergel, Bernhard, 2015. "Corporate social responsibility and Eurozone corporate bonds: The moderating role of country sustainability," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 538-549.
    10. Mine Ertugrul, 2013. "Employee-Friendly Acquirers And Acquisition Performance," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 36(3), pages 347-370, September.
    11. David A. Matsa & Amalia R. Miller, 2013. "A Female Style in Corporate Leadership? Evidence from Quotas," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(3), pages 136-169, July.
    12. Ben-Nasr, Hamdi & Alshwer, Abdullah A., 2016. "Does stock price informativeness affect labor investment efficiency?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 249-271.
    13. Henrik Cronqvist & Fredrik Heyman & Mattias Nilsson & Helena Svaleryd & Jonas Vlachos, 2009. "Do Entrenched Managers Pay Their Workers More?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(1), pages 309-339, February.
    14. You-Ta Chuang & Robin Church & Ron Ophir, 2011. "Taking Sides: The Interactive Influences of Institutional Mechanisms on the Adoption of Same-Sex Partner Health Benefits by Fortune 500 Corporations, 1990--2003," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 22(1), pages 190-209, February.
    15. Abhinav Gupta & Forrest Briscoe & Donald C. Hambrick, 2017. "Red, blue, and purple firms: Organizational political ideology and corporate social responsibility," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(5), pages 1018-1040, May.
    16. Ferrell, Allen & Liang, Hao & Renneboog, Luc, 2016. "Socially responsible firms," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 585-606.
    17. Jensen, Michael C. & Meckling, William H., 1976. "Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 305-360, October.
    18. Ahsan Habib & Mostafa M. Hasan, 2021. "Business Strategy and Labor Investment Efficiency," International Review of Finance, International Review of Finance Ltd., vol. 21(1), pages 58-96, March.
    19. Todd A. Gormley & David A. Matsa, 2014. "Common Errors: How to (and Not to) Control for Unobserved Heterogeneity," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(2), pages 617-661.
    20. Luigi Zingales, 2000. "In Search of New Foundations," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(4), pages 1623-1653, August.
    21. Tanja Artiga González & Paul Calluzzo & G Nathan Dong & Georg D Granic, 2022. "Determinants of LGBTQ+ Corporate Policies," The Review of Corporate Finance Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 11(3), pages 644-693.
    22. Jensen, Michael C, 1986. "Agency Costs of Free Cash Flow, Corporate Finance, and Takeovers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(2), pages 323-329, May.
    23. Pandej Chintrakarn & Sirimon Treepongkaruna & Pornsit Jiraporn & Sang Mook Lee, 2020. "Do LGBT-Supportive Corporate Policies Improve Credit Ratings? An Instrumental-Variable Analysis," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 162(1), pages 31-45, February.
    24. Li, Yiwei & Zeng, Yeqin, 2019. "The impact of top executive gender on asset prices: Evidence from stock price crash risk," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 528-550.
    25. Edmans, Alex, 2011. "Does the stock market fully value intangibles? Employee satisfaction and equity prices," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(3), pages 621-640, September.
    26. Macias, Antonio & Pirinsky, Christo, 2015. "Employees and the market for corporate control," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 33-53.
    27. Peters, Ryan H. & Taylor, Lucian A., 2017. "Intangible capital and the investment-q relation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 123(2), pages 251-272.
    28. Charles J. Hadlock & Joshua R. Pierce, 2010. "New Evidence on Measuring Financial Constraints: Moving Beyond the KZ Index," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 23(5), pages 1909-1940.
    29. Ben-Nasr, Hamdi & Ghouma, Hatem, 2018. "Employee welfare and stock price crash risk," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 700-725.
    30. Ghaly, Mohamed & Dang, Viet Anh & Stathopoulos, Konstantinos, 2020. "Institutional investors' horizons and corporate employment decisions," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    31. Lourdes Arco-Castro & Maria Victoria López-Pérez & Maria Carmen Pérez-López & Lázaro Rodríguez-Ariza, 2020. "Corporate philanthropy and employee engagement," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 14(4), pages 705-725, August.
    32. Liu, Chelsea, 2021. "CEO gender and employee relations: Evidence from labor lawsuits," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    33. Ghaly, Mohamed & Dang, Viet Anh & Stathopoulos, Konstantinos, 2015. "Cash holdings and employee welfare," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 53-70.
    34. Sualihu, Mohammed Aminu & Rankin, Michaela & Haman, Janto, 2021. "The role of equity compensation in reducing inefficient investment in labor," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    35. Khedmati, Mehdi & Sualihu, Mohammed Aminu & Yawson, Alfred, 2020. "CEO-director ties and labor investment efficiency," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    36. Brockman, Paul & Luo, Juan & Xu, Limin, 2020. "The impact of short-selling pressure on corporate employee relations," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    37. Searat Ali & Benjamin Liu & Jen Je Su, 2022. "Does corporate governance have a differential effect on downside and upside risk?," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(9-10), pages 1642-1695, October.
    38. Veda Fatmy & John Kihn & Jukka Sihvonen & Sami Vähämaa, 2022. "Does lesbian and gay friendliness pay off? A new look at LGBT policies and firm performance," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 62(1), pages 213-242, March.
    39. King, Gary & Nielsen, Richard, 2019. "Why Propensity Scores Should Not Be Used for Matching," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 27(4), pages 435-454, October.
    40. Boochun Jung & Woo†Jong Lee & David P. Weber, 2014. "Financial Reporting Quality and Labor Investment Efficiency," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 31(4), pages 1047-1076, December.
    41. Zhang, Zhuang & Ntim, Collins G. & Zhang, Qingjing & Elmagrhi, Mohamed H., 2020. "Does accounting comparability affect corporate employment decision-making?," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 52(6).
    42. Florian Berg & Julian F Kölbel & Roberto Rigobon, 2022. "Aggregate Confusion: The Divergence of ESG Ratings [Corporate social responsibility and firm risk: theory and empirical evidence]," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 26(6), pages 1315-1344.
    43. Schopohl, Lisa & Urquhart, Andrew & Zhang, Hanxiong, 2021. "Female CFOs, leverage and the moderating role of board diversity and CEO power," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    44. Feng Li & Venky Nagar, 2013. "Diversity and Performance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(3), pages 529-544, September.
    45. Verwijmeren, Patrick & Derwall, Jeroen, 2010. "Employee well-being, firm leverage, and bankruptcy risk," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(5), pages 956-964, May.
    46. Gonenc, Halit & Scholtens, Bert, 2017. "Environmental and Financial Performance of Fossil Fuel Firms: A Closer Inspection of their Interaction," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 307-328.
    47. Kyaw, Khine & Chindasombatcharoen, Pongsapak & Jiraporn, Pornsit & Treepongkaruna, Sirimon, 2021. "Do co-opted boards strategically choose LGBT-supportive policies?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    48. Ha, Joohyung & Feng, Mingming, 2018. "Conditional conservatism and labor investment efficiency," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(2), pages 143-163.
    49. Chowdhury, Hasibul & Hossain, Ashrafee & Masum, Abdullah-Al & Zheng, Jiayi, 2023. "Does corporate sexual orientation equality affect labor investment efficiency?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    50. Cao, Zhangfan & Rees, William, 2020. "Do employee-friendly firms invest more efficiently? Evidence from labor investment efficiency," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    51. Ayed, Sabrine & Waxin, Timothée, 2023. "LGBT discrimination and harassment, firm value, and reputation repair," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    52. Liwei Shan & Shihe Fu & Lu Zheng, 2017. "Corporate sexual equality and firm performance," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(9), pages 1812-1826, September.
    53. S. Boubaker & V.A. Dang & S. Sassi, 2022. "Competitive Pressure and Firm Investment Efficiency: Evidence from Corporate Employment Decisions," Post-Print hal-04435621, HAL.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chowdhury, Hasibul & Hossain, Ashrafee & Masum, Abdullah-Al & Zheng, Jiayi, 2023. "Does corporate sexual orientation equality affect labor investment efficiency?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    2. Cao, Zhangfan & Rees, William, 2020. "Do employee-friendly firms invest more efficiently? Evidence from labor investment efficiency," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    3. Wang, Maochuan & Yan, Youliang, 2023. "Employee treatment and corporate investment efficiency: Evidence from China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    4. Chowdhury, Hasibul & Estreich, Timothy & Hossain, Ashrafee & Zheng, Jiayi, 2024. "U.S. Political corruption and labor investment (in)efficiency," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    5. Cao, June & Li, Wenwen & Hasan, Iftekhar, 2023. "The impact of lowering carbon emissions on corporate labour investment: A quasi-natural experiment," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).
    6. Chowdhury, Hasibul & Hossain, Ashrafee & Tan, Kelvin & Zheng, Jiayi, 2022. "Do external labor market incentives improve labor investment efficiency?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C).
    7. Ee, Mong Shan & Hasan, Iftekhar & Huang, He, 2022. "Stock liquidity and corporate labor investment," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    8. Li, Bin & Zhao, Qizi & Shahab, Yasir & Kumar, Satish, 2023. "High-speed rail construction and labor investment efficiency: Evidence from an emerging market," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    9. Bai, Min & Fu, Yumei & Sun, Mingwei, 2023. "Corporate diversification and labor investment efficiency: Evidence from China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    10. Zuo, Junqing & Zhang, Wei & Hu, Mingya & Feng, Xu & Zou, Gaofeng, 2022. "Employee relations and stock price crash risk: Evidence from employee lawsuits," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    11. Singh, Amanjot, 2022. "Oil Price uncertainty and labor investment efficiency," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    12. Cao, Zhangfan & Rees, William & Zhang, Zhifang, 2023. "The effect of real earnings smoothing on corporate labour investment," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(6).
    13. Sophie Wang, Qing & Lai, Shaojie & Pi, Shuwen & Anderson, Hamish, 2022. "Does directors' and officers' liability insurance induce empire building? Evidence from corporate labor investment," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    14. Ghaly, Mohamed & Dang, Viet Anh & Stathopoulos, Konstantinos, 2020. "Institutional investors' horizons and corporate employment decisions," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    15. Sualihu, Mohammed Aminu & Rankin, Michaela & Haman, Janto, 2021. "The role of equity compensation in reducing inefficient investment in labor," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    16. Fan, Rui & Pan, Jianping & Yu, Minggui & Gao, Hao, 2022. "Corporate governance of controlling shareholders and labor employment decisions: Evidence from a parent board reform in China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    17. Jia, Jing & Li, Zhongtian, 2024. "Opioid abuse and labor investment efficiency," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 89(PA), pages 1267-1285.
    18. Ha, Joohyung & Feng, Mingming, 2018. "Conditional conservatism and labor investment efficiency," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(2), pages 143-163.
    19. Lai, Shaojie & Li, Xiaorong & Liu, Shiang & Wang, Qing Sophie, 2022. "Institutional investors’ site visits and corporate employment decision-making," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3).
    20. Anagnostopoulou, Seraina C. & Avgoustaki, Argyro, 2023. "The impact of human resource practices on corporate investment efficiency," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:finana:v:95:y:2024:i:pb:s1057521924004010. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620166 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.