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Are CEOs the Only Residual Claimants? Estimation of the Performance Elasticity of Per-Employee Compensation

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  • Bruce A. Rayton

    (Washington University-St. Louis, MO)

Abstract

This paper evaluates the intensity of the value-maximization incentives for average employees generated through wage, salary, and bonus mechanisms. This is accomplished through estimation of the elasticity of average employee hourly compensation with respect to changes in firm performance. This performance elasticity indicates the degree of alignment between employee and shareholder objectives, and it can also be interpreted as a residual income claim for employees. The estimated performance elasticity for the full sample of firms is indistinguishable from a CEO performance elasticity of 0.1 published in Coughlan and Schmidt (1985). The estimated performance elasticity is 0.152 in small firms and indistinguishable from zero in large firms. While CEO rewards are larger than the rewards of average employees in absolute terms, these rewards represent comparable fractions of income for both the CEO and the average employee. Firms use wage, salary and bonus adjustments to direct approximately 4.1 percent of firm value increases to employees. These results indicate that average employees hold a significant stake in firm performance.

Suggested Citation

  • Bruce A. Rayton, 1994. "Are CEOs the Only Residual Claimants? Estimation of the Performance Elasticity of Per-Employee Compensation," Industrial Organization 9412001, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 25 Mar 1996.
    • Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwpio:9412001
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Brian J. Hall & Jeffrey B. Liebman, 1998. "Are CEOs Really Paid Like Bureaucrats?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 113(3), pages 653-691.
    2. Harvey S. James Jr., 1997. "A Legal Basis for Workers as Agents: Employment Contracts, Common Law, and the Theory of the Firm," Law and Economics 9705001, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 04 Feb 2002.
    3. Bruce Rayton, 1997. "Rent-sharing or incentives? Estimating the residual claim of average employees," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 4(12), pages 725-728.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    incentives; agency costs; pay-performance sensitivities; profit-sharing;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J33 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Compensation Packages; Payment Methods
    • L14 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Transactional Relationships; Contracts and Reputation

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