Principal Costs: A New Theory for Corporate Law and Governance

64 Pages Posted: 3 Mar 2015 Last revised: 14 Jun 2017

See all articles by Zohar Goshen

Zohar Goshen

Columbia Law School; European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI); Ono Academic College Faculty of Law

Richard Squire

Fordham University School of Law; European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI)

Date Written: February 28, 2015

Abstract

The problem of managerial agency costs dominates debates in corporate law. Many leading scholars advocate reforms that would reduce agency costs by forcing firms to allocate more control to shareholders. Such proposals disregard the costs that shareholders avoid by delegating control to managers and voluntarily restricting their own control rights. This Essay introduces principal-cost theory, which posits that each firm’s optimal governance structure minimizes the sum of principal costs, produced when investors exercise control, and agent costs, produced when managers exercise control. Both principal costs and agent costs can arise from honest mistakes (which generate competence costs) and from disloyal conduct (which generates conflict costs). Because the expected costs of competence and conflict are firm-specific, the optimal division of control is firm-specific as well. Thus, firms rationally select from a range of governance structures that empower shareholders to varying degrees. The empirical predictions produced by principal-cost theory are more accurate than those produced by any theory focused solely on agency costs. Principal-cost theory also suggests different policy prescriptions. Rather than banning some governance features and mandating others, lawmakers should permit each firm to tailor its governance structure based on its firm-specific tradeoff between principal costs and agent costs.

Keywords: principal costs, agency costs, governance structure, theory of the firm, dual class, concentrated ownership, dispersed ownership,

JEL Classification: D20, D21, D23, D24, G30, G32, G34, K22, L20, L21, L22

Suggested Citation

Goshen, Zohar and Squire, Richard C., Principal Costs: A New Theory for Corporate Law and Governance (February 28, 2015). Columbia Law Review, Vol. 117, No. 767, 2017, Fordham Law Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2571739, Columbia Public Law Research Paper No. 14-462, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2571739 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2571739

Zohar Goshen (Contact Author)

Columbia Law School ( email )

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European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI) ( email )

c/o the Royal Academies of Belgium
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Belgium

Ono Academic College Faculty of Law

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Kiryat Ono, 55000
Israel

HOME PAGE: http://www.ono.ac.il

Richard C. Squire

Fordham University School of Law ( email )

150 West 62nd Street
New York, NY 10023
United States
212-964-1584 (Phone)

European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI) ( email )

c/o the Royal Academies of Belgium
Rue Ducale 1 Hertogsstraat
1000 Brussels
Belgium

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