14:15 - 15:45
Is Cash Still King: Why Firms Offer Non-Wage Compensation and the Implications for Shareholder Value
Over the past 40 years, the share of non-wage benefits in employee compensation grew from 5% to 30%. Using disaggregated data from Glassdoor, we first document a series of stylized facts about the availability of non-wage benefits and how these benefits are correlated with firm characteristics.
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Over the past 40 years, the share of non-wage benefits in employee compensation grew from 5% to 30%. Using disaggregated data from Glassdoor, we first document a series of stylized facts about the availability of non-wage benefits and how these benefits are correlated with firm characteristics. We propose that firms use certain non-wage benefits to attract and retain specific employee groups, a hypothesis we test with maternity benefits and female talent. As predicted, we find that in industries and states where women are under- represented and the supply of female talent is limited, firms offer better quality maternity benefits. We provide suggestive evidence that offering non ernity benefits is associated with more balanced gender employee composition.