Discrimination, Managers, and Firm Performance: Evidence from “Aryanizations” in Nazi Germany

Kilian Huber, Volker Lindenthal and Fabian Waldinger

Journal of Political Economy, 2021, vol. 129, issue 9, 2455 - 2503

Abstract: Large-scale increases in discrimination can lead to dismissals of highly qualified managers. We investigate how expulsions of senior Jewish managers, due to rising discrimination in Nazi Germany, affected large corporations. Firms that lost Jewish managers experienced persistent reductions in stock prices, dividends, and returns on assets. Aggregate market value fell by roughly 1.8% of German GNP because of the expulsions. Managers who served as key connectors to other firms and managers who were highly educated were particularly important for firm performance. The findings imply that individual managers drive firm performance. Discrimination against qualified business leaders causes first-order economic losses.

Date: 2021
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (37)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/714994 (application/pdf)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/714994 (text/html)
Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

Related works:
Working Paper: Discrimination, Managers, and Firm Performance: Evidence from “Aryanizations” in Nazi Germany (2021)
Working Paper: Discrimination, Manager, and Firm Performance: Evidence from "Aryanizations" in Nazi Germany (2020)
Working Paper: Discrimination, Managers, and Firm Performance: Evidence from "Aryanizations" in Nazi Germany (2020)
Working Paper: Discrimination, managers, and firm performance: evidence from “Aryanizations” in Nazi Germany (2019)
Working Paper: Discrimination, managers, and firm performance: evidence from “Aryanizations” in Nazi Germany (2019)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ucp:jpolec:doi:10.1086/714994

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Political Economy from University of Chicago Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Journals Division ().