Does Corporate Governance Enhance Common Interests of Shareholders and Primary Stakeholders?

Employing a unique dataset of Chinese non-listed firms, this paper investigates the effects of the presence of 19 governance structures on 20 employees’ interest indicators. In general, we find that firms with the governance structures pay workers higher hourly wages, require less monthly working ho...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Zhong, Ninghua (Author) ; Wang, Shujing (Author) ; Yang, Rudai (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Springer Science + Business Media B. V 2017
In: Journal of business ethics
Year: 2017, Volume: 141, Issue: 2, Pages: 411-431
Further subjects:B Efficiency wage theory
B Corporate governance
B Employees’ interests
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Summary:Employing a unique dataset of Chinese non-listed firms, this paper investigates the effects of the presence of 19 governance structures on 20 employees’ interest indicators. In general, we find that firms with the governance structures pay workers higher hourly wages, require less monthly working hours, and have a smaller chance of wage arrears. Meanwhile, the shares of total wage and welfare expenditures in total sales revenue are lower in these firms, which results in higher profitability. Moreover, firms with the governance structures invest significantly more into training and provide employees with better fringe benefits. Considering the low labor protection standard and the weak external regulations of China’s labor market, we explain the positive findings thusly: corporate governance structures induce managers to adjust wage payments to the “efficiency wage” level, which is the best balance point for the interests of both shareholders and employees and, therefore, for maintaining the stakeholder relationships. We also find the governance structures that give blockholders superpower are negatively associated with employees interests. These results highlight the importance of giving enough discretion to managers in order to successfully find the common ground for creating mutual values for shareholders and employees.
ISSN:1573-0697
Reference:Errata "Erratum to: Does Corporate Governance Enhance Common Interests of Shareholders and Primary Stakeholders? (2017)"
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal of business ethics
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10551-015-2702-5