Investigating corporate management lobbying in the U.K. accounting standard-setting process: a multi-issue/multi-period approach

Author: Georgiou, George

Source: Abacus, Volume 41, Number 3, October 2005 , pp. 323-347(25)

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Abstract:

A large body of literature examines the motives of corporate managers to lobby accounting standard-setters. In general, studies confine their examination to single episodes of the standard-setting process (e.g., exposure draft). This article extends the literature by adopting a multi-issue/multi-period approach to investigate corporate lobbying of the U.K.'s ASB. The findings suggest that the extent of corporate lobbying, defined on the basis of the frequency with which companies made submissions to all of the publications issued by the ASB over a six-year period, depends on the size of companies, the debt covenant costs they face and whether they are listed on a U.S. stock exchange. Separate analyses, however, involving (a) the frequency of lobbying on income-related issues and (b) the frequency of lobbying on disclosure issues revealed that, while all these three variables explain lobbying on income-related issues, only size is significant in explaining lobbying on disclosure issues. The results also suggest that the debt to equity ratio is an imperfect proxy for debt covenant costs.

Keywords: Accounting; ASB; Longitudinal; Standard setting; U.K

Document Type: Research article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6281.2005.00185.x

Publication date: 2005-10-01