Does Ownership Matter? Empirical Evidence from the German Wine Industry
利用约300家德国酒庄的面板数据，研究发现由职业经理人管理的酒庄比所有者管理的酒庄生产出质量更高、价格更贵的葡萄酒，竞争环境下人力资本差异可能是主因。
SUMMARY There is widespread belief among economists that the separation of ownership and control tends to reduce the performance of companies while competition tends to improve it. Irrespective of their theoretical appeal these assumptions have not been tested very often. Using an unbalanced panel of about 300 German wineries (compiled from four different editions of a highly respected and widely used wine guide), the paper shows that firms run by ‘managing directors’ produce higher quality and more expensive wines than otherwise identical owner‐managed firms. Since firms have identical production functions and due to the intense competition in the sector under consideration it is very likely that differences in human capital explain the observed productivity differences.