Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to analyze if choices made by family businesses (FBs) regarding job stability in economic recessions are different, on average, to those made by nonfamily firms. Moreover, the study tries to elucidate if this potential difference depends on the family generation that is in charge. The analysis relies upon a sample of 55,091 Spanish firms, as Spain is one of the countries that suffered the greatest impact of the 2008 Great Recession.

Design/methodology/approach

To test the hypotheses, the authors built a database of 55,091 Spanish firms, 45,351 family firms and 9,740 nonfamily firms, for the period 2007–2015. Based on the socioemotional wealth (SEW) approach, this article sheds light on the question of whether family identification, binding social ties and long-term vision lead FB to behave differently from nonfamily businesses in human resource management.

Findings

In times of crisis, FBs do maintain jobs to a higher extent than nonfamily businesses, and this effect is especially intense when the first generation is in charge. According to the SEW approach, the emotional links between ownership and management make the firm more prudent when hiring during good times and when firing in times of crisis. This makes employment in FBs more stable than in private ones. This result has two positive effects. Higher job stability is an additional contribution of family firms to social welfare and happiness. Furthermore, a larger share of family firms involves stronger automatic macrostabilizers to deal with the business cycle, supplementing fiscal macrostabilizers, such as personal income tax (PIT) or unemployment insurance.

Practical implications

Family firms maintained employment more than nonfamily firms did during the crisis. The emotional links between ownership and management and the long-term vision make the firm more prudent when hiring during good times and when firing in times of crisis. These features could make family firms more cautious in terms of hiring and firing and thus enable them to offer their employees implicit employment protection and stability. This positive effect decreases as firm age advances, due to the minor linkage between ownership and employees, in spite of maintaining identification and long-term vision.

Social implications

From a policy perspective, greater job stability is an additional contribution of family firms to social welfare and happiness. Hence, a larger share of family firms would involve stronger automatic macrostabilizers to deal with the business cycle, supplementing well-known fiscal macrostabilizers such as the PIT or unemployment insurance. The idea of family firms as countercyclical agents linking the micro dimension with the macro dimension becomes more interesting in the present context with the crisis generated by COVID-19.

Originality/value

In addition to contributing to the scarce literature on FB and employment in times of crisis, this paper also considers the generational effect on employment in the economic crisis context from the SEW approach. In addition, sound econometric methodology applied using an extremely large database grounded the results. In contrast with studies in the FB field that have typically focused on large listed firms (Mazzi, 2011), the study relies upon a database of privately held companies, which are more representative of FBs in civil law countries, such as Spain. The Spanish case is particularly interesting because it was one of the OECD countries shocked by the Great Recession. Finally, the authors propose family firms as countercyclical agents linking the micro dimension to the macro dimension.

中文翻译：

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家族企业有助于稳定工作吗？大衰退的证据

目的

本文的目的是分析平均而言，家族企业 (FB) 在经济衰退中对工作稳定性的选择是否与非家族企业的选择不同。此外，该研究试图阐明这种潜在差异是否取决于负责的家庭一代。该分析依赖于 55,091 家西班牙公司的样本，因为西班牙是遭受 2008 年大衰退影响最大的国家之一。

设计/方法/方法

为了检验这些假设，作者建立了一个包含 2007-2015 年期间 55,091 家西班牙公司、45,351 家家族企业和 9,740 家非家族企业的数据库。基于社会情感财富 (SEW) 方法，本文阐明了家庭认同、约束性社会纽带和长期愿景是否导致 FB 在人力资源管理方面表现出与非家族企业不同的问题。

发现

在危机时期，FB 确实比非家族企业更能保住工作岗位，这种影响在第一代掌权时尤为强烈。根据 SEW 方法，所有权和管理层之间的情感联系使公司在景气时招聘和危机时解雇时更加谨慎。这使得在 FB 的就业比在私营企业更稳定。这个结果有两个积极的影响。更高的工作稳定性是家族企业对社会福利和幸福的额外贡献。此外，更大份额的家族企业涉及更强大的自动宏观稳定器来应对商业周期，补充财政宏观稳定器，例如个人所得税 (PIT) 或失业保险。

实际影响

在危机期间，家族企业比非家族企业更能维持就业。所有权和管理层之间的情感联系以及长期愿景使公司在景气时期招聘和危机时期解雇时更加谨慎。这些特点可以使家族企业在招聘和解雇方面更加谨慎，从而使他们能够为员工提供隐性的就业保护和稳定。尽管保持了认同感和长期愿景，但由于所有权和员工之间的联系很小，这种积极影响随着公司年龄的增长而减弱。

社会影响

从政策的角度来看，更大的工作稳定性是家族企业对社会福利和幸福的额外贡献。因此，更大份额的家族企业将涉及更强大的自动宏观稳定器来应对商业周期，以补充众所周知的财政宏观稳定器，例如 PIT 或失业保险。在当前 COVID-19 引发的危机背景下，将家族企业作为反周期代理将微观维度与宏观维度联系起来的想法变得更加有趣。

原创性/价值

除了为危机时期关于 FB 和就业的稀缺文献做出贡献外，本文还考虑了 SEW 方法在经济危机背景下对就业的代际效应。此外，使用一个非常大的数据库应用的健全的计量经济学方法为结果奠定了基础。与通常专注于大型上市公司的 FB 领域的研究相比（Mazzi，2011 年），该研究依赖于私人控股公司的数据库，这些公司更能代表民法国家（如西班牙）的 FB。西班牙的案例特别有趣，因为它是被大萧条震惊的经合组织国家之一。最后，作者建议将家族企业作为将微观维度与宏观维度联系起来的反周期代理。