The Flattening Firm and Product Market Competition: The Effect of Trade Liberalization on Corporate Hierarchies
利用美国大型企业层级面板数据（1986-1999）和贸易自由化准自然实验，研究发现产品市场竞争促使企业扁平化层级，即减少CEO与部门经理之间的职位数量，增加直接向CEO汇报的职位数量。
This paper establishes a causal effect of product market competition on various characteristics of organizational design. Using a unique panel dataset on firm hierarchies of large US firms (1986–1999) and a quasi-natural experiment (trade liberalization), we find that competition leads firms to flatten their hierarchies: firms reduce the number of positions between the CEO and division managers, and firms increase the number of positions reporting directly to the CEO. The results illustrate how firms redesign their organizational structure through a set of complementary choices in response to changes in their environment. We discuss several possible interpretations of these changes.