We examine the equity ownership structure and board composition of a sample of 583 firms over the ten-year period 1983–1992. Our evidence suggests that a substantial fraction of firms exhibit large changes in ownership and board structure in any given year. These changes are correlated with one another and are not reversed in subsequent years. Ownership and board changes are strongly related to top executive turnover, prior stock price performance, and corporate control threats, but only weakly related to changes in firm-specific determinants of ownership and board structure. Furthermore, large ownership changes are typically preceded by economic shocks and followed by asset restructurings.

This study examines the empirical relation between stock returns and (long-run) dividend yields. The findings show that much of the phenomenon is due to a nonlinear relation between dividend yields and returns in January. Regression coefficients on dividend yields, which some models predict should be non-zero due to differential taxation of dividends and capital gains, exhibit a significant January seasonal, even when controlling for size. This finding is significant since there are no provisions in the after-tax asset pricing models that predict the tax differential is more important in January than in other months.

During 1984–1996, welfare and tax policy were changed to encourage work by single mothers. The Earned Income Tax Credit was expanded, welfare benefits were cut, welfare time limits were added, and welfare cases were terminated. Medicaid for the working poor was expanded, as were training programs and child care. During this same time period there were unprecedented increases in the employment and hours of single mothers. We show that a large share of the increase in work by single mothers can be attributed to the EITC and other tax changes, with smaller shares for welfare benefit cuts, welfare waivers, training programs and child care programs.

I. The state variables: balance sheets and information, 279. — II. The model, 284. — III. Numerical illustrations of monetary control, 290. — IV. Conclusions, 301. — Appendix: Derivation of Figure I, 303.

Scope of the paper, 1. — Historical background, 2. — Experience after World War I: United States, 4; Canada, 6; Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom, 8. — Resettlement and rehabilitation in the United States: unemployment, 9; rural distress, 10; the Farm Security Administration projects, 11. — Other FSA opportunities: rehabilitation loans, 16; tenant purchase loans, 16. — The new legislation: Canada, 17; New Zealand, 20; United States, 20. — Limited value of certain provisions of the "G. I. Bill": present owners, 22; prospective tenants, 24; prospective buyers, 24. — The legislative background: United States, 27; Canada, 28. — Need for soldier settlement, 29. — Loan values, 31. — Tenant purchase as an alternative, 33. — Concluding remarks, 34.

I examine the role of convenience in the mutual fund industry. I find that investors pay more for relatively convenient funds, and that the flows to convenient funds are less responsive to performance. These findings suggest that investors do not evaluate mutual funds independently, but rather that investors select a primary fund, likely based on beliefs about managerial ability, and then select funds which are relatively convenient to this primary fund.

I examine the ex ante decision to make an agent's pay-performance sensitivity an inverse function of organization size. I focus on mutual funds and their decision to use compensation contracts that reduce the advisor's marginal compensation as the fund grows (a declining-rate contract) over the dominant contract type, where marginal compensation is unrelated to fund size (a single-rate contract). I find evidence consistent with the view that declining-rate contracts are a mechanism to keep marginal compensation in line with the advisor's declining marginal product. Specifically, I find that funds with greater exposure to diseconomies of scale are more likely to use a declining-rate contract and to specify a greater amount of compensation decline in their contracts. Consistent with optimal contracting, I find no evidence of a performance difference between funds with declining-rate contracts and funds with single-rate contracts.

I provide new tests of regulatory impact on informed trading in the stock market. After the implementation of Reg FD there is a significant decrease in the Hasbrouck [Hasbrouck, J., 1991a. The summary informativeness of stock trades: an econometric analysis. Review of Financial Studies 4, 571–595.] summary informativeness statistic, a measure of informed trading based on intra-daily trade level data. But, the switch to decimalization on the New York Stock Exchange has a much larger impact on this measure. These results highlight the difficulty in attributing specific effects to broad based regulatory events.

I show that median earnings surprise has shifted rightward from small negative (miss analyst estimates by a small amount) to zero (meet analyst estimates exactly) to small positive (beat analyst estimates by a small amount) during the 16 years, 1984 to 1999. I show that a rightward temporal shift in median surprise from negative to positive describes earnings, but neither profits nor losses. Median profit surprise shifts within the positive quadrant, from zero to one cent per share. Median loss surprise shifts within the negative quadrant from extreme negative (about ‐33 cents per share) to zero. I show that the median surprise for profits exceeds that for losses in every year. I document significant positive temporal trends in both meet and beat analyst estimates for both profits and losses, but I find a greater frequency of profits that either meet or beat analyst estimates in every year. I find a significant positive temporal trend in positive profits that are “a little bit of good news,” and a significant negative temporal trend in managers who report losses that are an “extreme amount of bad news.” My results are robust to the four internal validity threats I consider—namely temporal changes in: (1) analyst forecast accuracy, (2) the mix of earnings of one sign preceded by earnings of another sign four quarters ago, (3) the timeliness of the most recent analyst forecast, and (4) the I/B/E/S definition of actual earnings. I find that managers of growth firms are relatively more likely than managers of value firms to report good news profits. I show that when they do report positive profit surprises, managers of growth firms are more likely to report “a little bit of good news” in every year.

Accounting changes, Analyst forecasts, Forecast accuracy, Earnings announcement