Financial statement comparability and employment stability around the world

Abstract

In a global economy prone to demand shocks, firms increasingly rely on implicit contracts to stabilize employment. We investigate whether financial statement comparability strengthens these contracts by enabling employees to benchmark their firm’s performance against that of peers, facilitating mutual risk sharing. Using firm-level data from 44 countries, we find that higher comparability reduces layoffs during downturns and tempers aggressive hiring during upturns, consistent with balanced labor adjustment under implicit contracting. Employees at high-comparability firms are also more willing to accept lower wages without compromising productivity, reflecting enhanced trust and cooperation. Further analyses suggest that comparability improves employees’ ability to monitor firm behavior, particularly when social safety nets are strong, earnings are transparent, industries are competitive, and firms deviate from peer norms. Exploiting the mandatory adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) as an exogenous shock to comparability supports causal inference. Overall, our findings highlight comparability as a powerful governance mechanism that aligns firm–employee incentives in implicit employment contracts and offers practical guidance for managers and policymakers seeking to strengthen labor market resilience across diverse institutional contexts.