Showing results 1 - 5 of 5
| Abigail Allen
Public Pension Accounting Reform: Preparer Incentives and User Interest. Abigail Allen, September 2015, Paper. "We examine the lobbying behavior of state governments and their financial statement users in the development of public pension accounting standards GASB 67 and 68. We find that states’ opposition to liability increasing provisions is increasing in the severity of pension plan underfunding, budget deficits, balanced budget requirements…
| Abigail Allen | Karthik Ramanna
Auditor Lobbying on Accounting Standards. Abigail M. Allen, Karthik Ramanna, December 22, 2014, Paper. "We examine how Big N auditors’ changing incentives impact their comment-letter lobbying on U.S. GAAP over the first thirty-four years of the FASB (1973-2006). We examine the influence of auditors’ lobbying incentives arising from three basic factors: managing expected litigation and regulatory costs; catering to clients’ preferences for…
| Abigail Allen | Karthik Ramanna
The Auditing Oligopoly and Lobbying on Accounting Standards. Abigail M. Allen, Karthik Ramanna, August 19, 2013, Paper. “Since at least the 1970s, the audit market in the U.S. has functioned as an oligopoly, with a few large firms providing audit services for the vast majority of public companies. The past twenty-five years have witnessed a steady tightening of the oligopoly, with the number of big audit firms (hereafter, the Big N) declining…
| Abigail Allen | Karthik Ramanna
The Auditing Oligopoly and Lobbying on Accounting Standards. Karthik Ramanna, Abigail M. Allen, August 19, 2013, Paper. "We examine how the tightening of the U.S. auditing oligopoly over the last twenty-five years — from the Big 8 to the Big 6, the Big 5, and, then, the Big 4 — has affected the incentives of the Big N, as manifest in their lobbying preferences on accounting standards. We find, as the oligopoly has tightened, Big N auditors are…
| Abigail Allen | Karthik Ramanna
Towards an Understanding of the Role of Standard Setters in Standard Setting. Abigail Allen, Karthik Ramanna, May 24, 2012, Paper. "We investigate the effect of standard setters in standard setting: We examine how certain professional and political characteristics of FASB members and SEC commissioners predict the accounting “reliability” and “relevance” of proposed standards. Notably, we find FASB members with backgrounds in financial services…