Between 1973 and 1987, men's average earnings declined and the percentage of men with low earnings (defined as annual earnings less than $12,000 a year) increased for whites, blacks, and Hispanics. We estimate regression models for the level and distribution of male earnings for each of these three groups using data from the 1974, 1980, and 1988 March Current Population Surveys. Much of the dec...

Several Social Security proposals have included benefit formula changes that apply to earners above a specified percentage of the combined male and female (unisex) lifetime earnings distribution. The unisex distribution is an average of two disparate groups with large lifetime differences in labor market participation. This study finds that if Social Security's median unisex average indexed mon...

In this study, I investigate the informativeness of aggregate equity purchases and sales by senior corporate officers and directors in a sample of 39 countries. I find that countrylevel insider trading signals are associated with future country-level market returns, controlling for other contemporaneous signals such as country-level earnings guidance and analysts’ forecasts, and risk factors su...

Tests of the life cycle human capital investment theory using the implied restrictions on the covariance structure of earnings have not been favorable to the theory. The theory implies that earnings follow individual specific growth paths, which has been modeled as a random coefficient on experience, or “random growth.” The random growth model implies an individual effect in earnings changes. A...

Earnings press releases are ‘‘the major news event of the season for many companies as well as investors, analysts, financial media, and the market’’ (Mahoney and Lewis 2004). The information content of earnings press releases has increased significantly over time (Kross and Kim 2000; Lo and Lys 2001; Francis, Schipper, and Vincent 2002a, 2002b; Landsman and Maydew 2002; Collins, Li, and Xie 20...

We develop and estimate a model of the dynamic behavior of aggregate corporate dividends as a function of the change in permanent earnings of firms. Although structured along the lines of the Lintner-Brittain-FamaBabiak models of individual-firm dividend behavior, the model uses changes in stock prices instead of accounting earnings to measure permanent earnings changes. The performance of the ...

Earnings, sometimes called the “bottom line” or “net income,” are the single most important item in financial statements. They indicate the extent to which a company has engaged in value-added activities. They are a signal that helps direct resource allocation in capital markets. In fact, the theoretical value of a company’s stock is the present value of its future earnings. Increased earnings ...