Firm Performance Under Government Regulation
Open Access
- Author:
- Swift, Caroline Ann
- Graduate Program:
- Business Administration
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- August 04, 2020
- Committee Members:
- V Daniel R Guide, Jr., Dissertation Advisor/Co-Advisor
V Daniel R Guide, Jr., Committee Chair/Co-Chair
Suresh Muthulingam, Committee Member
Saurabh Bansal, Committee Member
Margaret Grace Meloy, Outside Member
Brent William Ambrose, Program Head/Chair - Keywords:
- sustainability
supply chain management
conflict minerals
corporate average fuel economy
event study
regulations - Abstract:
- While “sustainability” might sometimes be discounted as a research buzzword, the reality is that firms are facing increasing pressure to operate more sustainably, responsibly, and ethically. Moreover, the fact remains that business is a prime contributor to many environmental and social plights of the world. To combat this, many developed nations have turned to laws and regulations of commercial activity to force (or at least nudge) firms into better environmental and social practices. The two essays in this dissertation explore how these types of regulations affect firm operations and performance. The first essay (Chapter 2) explores the effects of a social sustainability regulation. I find that firms with more visibility into their conflict minerals supply chains outperform comparable firms with lower supply chain visibility on profitability, sales performance, and long-term market value. The second essay (Chapter 3) examines the impact of a regulation with direct environmental consequences. I find that increased stringency of the fuel efficiency standards for passenger vehicles has no negative consequences for automotive firm valuation. Furthermore, rollbacks of the regulation actually result in negative stock performance.