Employee Costs of Corporate Bankruptcy

John R. Graham, Hyunseob Kim, Si Li and Jiaping Qiu

No 25922, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: An employee’s annual earnings fall by 10% the year her firm files for bankruptcy and fall by a cumulative present value of 67% over seven years. This effect is more pronounced in thin labor markets and among small firms that are ultimately liquidated. Compensating wage differentials for this “bankruptcy risk” are approximately 2.3% of firm value for a firm whose credit rating falls from AA to BBB, about the same magnitude as debt tax benefits. Thus, wage premia for expected costs of bankruptcy are of sufficient magnitude to be an important consideration in corporate capital structure decisions.

JEL-codes: G32 G33 J21 J31 J61 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cfn and nep-lab
Note: CF LS
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

Published as JOHN R. GRAHAM & HYUNSEOB KIM & SI LI & JIAPING QIU, 2023. "Employee Costs of Corporate Bankruptcy," The Journal of Finance, vol 78(4), pages 2087-2137.

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