Labor supply and accounting firm mergers

In this paper, I study how regulation-induced accounting labor supply shocks affect the audit market. Using a novel dataset that includes both large and small accounting firms, I identify labor supply shocks using the 150-Hour Rule and the Mobility Provision and investigate the resulting incidence of mergers and acquisitions (M&A). I find that a reduction in labor supply increases accounting firms' M&A activity and leads to a higher audit market concentration. My results suggest that accounting firm growth decisions and audit market structure depend on the supply of labor.

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctoral

Department dc:contributor.department

Sloan School of Management

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2020

Author dc:creator

• Abramova, Inna,Ph. D.Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Joseph P. Weber.

• Sloan School of Management.

Statement dc:rights

• MIT theses may be protected by copyright. Please reuse MIT thesis content according to the MIT Libraries Permissions Policy, which is available through the URL provided.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/126982

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/126982