Stakeholder Rights and Economic Performance: The Profitability of Nonprofits

Abstract

This paper explores whether ownership matters in a fundamental sense by comparing the performance of stockholder-owned firms with the much less analyzed nonprofit firms. No stakeholder has residual cash flow rights in nonprofit firms, and the control rights are held by customers, employees, and community citizens. Accounting for differences in size and risk and comparing only firms in the same industry, we find that stockholder-owned firms do not outperform nonprofit firms. This result is consistent with the notion that the monitoring function of stockholders may be successfully replaced by other mechanisms. We find evidence that product market competition may play this role as a substitute monitoring mechanism.

Keywords: Corporate governance, Stakeholders, Nonprofits, Competition, Banks

JEL Classification: G34, L33