Shadow union in local labor markets and corporate financing policies
研究发现，当其他企业工会获胜后，非工会企业会提高杠杆率并减少现金持有，这种“影子工会”效应源于工会化威胁增大，促使企业采取更激进的财务政策来应对。
This paper identifies an externality of a firm’s unionization that affects the financing decisions of non-unionized firms within a local labor market. We find that non-unionized firms increase their leverage ratios and hold less cash reserves following a union victory at other firms. This “shadow union” effect manifests through the heightened threat of unionization following shadow union organizing. Specifically, the effect is more pronounced when the probability of unionization rises by a larger margin and non-union firms face higher union rents conditional on being unionized. The threat appears credible enough to shape corporate financing decisions: shadow unions raise employees’ wages and the likelihood of subsequent union victories in the local labor market. Additional results indicate that the shadow union effect is distinct from leverage-mimicking behavior. Overall, our findings suggest that shadow labor market institutions create a strategic incentive for non-unionized firms to adopt less conservative financial policies to combat the union threat.