Abstract

Existing studies of the political determinants of top incomes and inequality tend to focus on developments within individual countries, neglecting the role of interdependencies that transcend national borders. This article argues that the sharp rises in top incomes observed in recent years are in part a product of specific features originating in the US political economy, which were subsequently exported to other economies through the global expansion of US-based financial investors. To test the argument, we collect fine-grained micro-level data on executive pay and firm ownership structures for a comprehensive sample of publicly listed firms in the United Kingdom (UK). Our analyses uncover robust evidence that the Americanization of UK firm ownership leads to the financialization of remuneration practices and sizeable pay increases for high-level managers at those firms. Scrutinizing the causal mechanisms underlying this effect, we find them to be more consistent with changes in bargaining power inside firms rather than coercion from outside or exogenous shifts in labor markets for executives. The findings show the disruptive potential of Wall Street investments abroad to empower local managerial elites to capture greater rents and, more generally, demonstrate the need to take the transnational seriously in order to understand patterns of inequality in the global political economy.

摘要

对最高收入和不平等的政治决定因素的现有研究往往侧重于个别国家内部的发展，而忽视了超越国界的相互依存关系的作用。本文认为，近年来观察到的最高收入的急剧增长部分是源于美国政治经济的特定特征的产物，这些特征随后通过美国金融投资者的全球扩张输出到其他经济体。为了检验这一论点，我们为英国 (UK) 的上市公司的综合样本收集了有关高管薪酬和公司所有权结构的细粒度微观数据。我们的分析发现了强有力的证据，表明英国公司所有权的美国化导致了薪酬实践的金融化以及这些公司高级管理人员的大幅加薪。仔细研究这种影响背后的因果机制，我们发现它们更符合公司内部议价能力的变化，而不是来自外部的胁迫或高管劳动力市场的外生变化。研究结果表明，华尔街的海外投资具有颠覆性潜力，可以让当地管理精英获得更高的租金，并且更普遍地表明，需要认真对待跨国投资，以了解全球政治经济中的不平等模式。我们发现它们更符合公司内部议价能力的变化，而不是来自外部的胁迫或高管劳动力市场的外生变化。研究结果表明，华尔街的海外投资具有颠覆性潜力，可以让当地管理精英获得更高的租金，并且更普遍地表明，需要认真对待跨国投资，以了解全球政治经济中的不平等模式。我们发现它们更符合公司内部议价能力的变化，而不是来自外部的胁迫或高管劳动力市场的外生变化。研究结果表明，华尔街的海外投资具有颠覆性潜力，可以让当地管理精英获得更高的租金，并且更普遍地表明，需要认真对待跨国投资，以了解全球政治经济中的不平等模式。