Abstract The public debate over the need to raise judicial salaries has been one-sided. Sentiment appears to be that judges are underpaid. But neither theory nor evidence provides much support for this view. The primary argument being made in favor of a pay increase is that it will raise the quality of judging. Theory suggests that increasing judicial salaries will improve judicial perform…
We study the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) enforcement decisions in the context of the highly salient back-dating scandal. We find that (1) the SEC shifted its mix of investigations significantly toward backdating and away from other accounting issues; (2) event studies of stock market reactions to the initial disclosure of backdating investigations shows that those reactions…