Relying on empirical archival methodologies—as well as techniques in data science—to develop and structure new sources of data by which to approach questions of looming disclosure changes, Professor Rouen has focused on one of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s most controversial recent disclosure requirements, the CEO pay ratio. In his research, he examines the ratio of CEO compensation to mean employee compensation, and its relation to future firm performance. Professor Rouen’s results are among the first to provide evidence that differing types of pay disparity can have differing effects on employees and firms, a finding that is important to politicians, regulators, and investors preparing to understand a radical new disclosure.
Professor Rouen has also studied financial statement errors. His research shows that reported financial statement numbers conform to the mathematical distribution defined by Benford’s Law (i.e., the law of first digits). After creating a measure of divergence from conformity to the law as a proxy for data quality, Professor Rouen has found evidence that this measure is associated with proxies for accruals-based accounting quality and earnings management. In addition, the measure is predictive of Accounting and Auditing Enforcement Releases. He has received several awards for his work in this area, and the measure of financial statement errors he and his co-authors developed has been used by the S.E.C., as well as data providers and investment banks.
The impact of the corporate tax regime in the United States on the relation between the performance of U.S. corporations and the overall economy is another of Professor Rouen’s interests. This examination is timely as world leaders debate how to discourage corporate tax shifting, and U.S. multinationals wrestle with managing the more than $2 trillion in cash they hold abroad. Professor Rouen has documented that as the domestic corporate tax rate rises relative to tax rates of other countries, fewer corporate profits flow into domestic investment. The results provide valuable evidence for policy makers examining how to tax the foreign profits of domestic companies.
Ethan C. Rouen
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Assistant Professor of Business Administration
Ethan Rouen is an assistant professor of business administration in the Accounting and Management Unit, where he teaches the elective course Reimagining Capitalism.
His current research interest focuses on understanding what gives rise to income inequality and how best to measure inequality to develop better strategies for addressing this issue. In 2018, he was awarded the Best Dissertation Award from the Financial Accounting and Reporting Section of the American Accounting Association. In 2017, he was awarded the Deloitte Foundation Wildman Medal from the American Accounting Association for recent research that has had the greatest impact on the practice of accounting. His research has been published in The Accounting Review, Management Science, and Review of Accounting Studies, and his journalism and opinion articles have appeared in the Boston Globe, HuffPo, The Hill, CEOWORLD Magazine, and Fortune.com, among others. He appears frequently in national and international media outlets, discussing income inequality and issues related to corporate taxes.
Professor Rouen earned a BA in history and English from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and an MS in journalism at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. From Columbia Business School, he received an MBA in finance and accounting, an M.Phil. in accounting, and a PhD in accounting.
- Journal Articles
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- Rouen, Ethan, Eric C. So, and Charles C.Y. Wang. "Core Earnings: New Data and Evidence." Journal of Financial Economics (forthcoming). View Details
- Khan, Urooj, Suresh Nallareddy, and Ethan Rouen. "The Role of Taxes in the Disconnect Between Corporate Performance and Economic Growth." Management Science 66, no. 11 (November 2020): 5427–5447. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan. "Rethinking Measurement of Pay Disparity and Its Relation to Firm Performance." Accounting Review 95, no. 1 (January 2020): 343–378. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan. "Continue the Revolt that CEOs Launched." Boston Globe (August 19, 2017). View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, Dan Amiram, and Zahn Bozanic. "Financial Statement Errors: Evidence from the Distributional Properties of Financial Statement Numbers." Review of Accounting Studies 20, no. 4 (December 2015): 1540–1593. View Details
- Working Papers
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- Regier, Matthias, and Ethan Rouen. "The Stock Market Value of Human Capital Creation." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 21-047, October 2020. View Details
- Nallareddy, Suresh, Ethan Rouen, and Juan Carlos Suárez Serrato. "Corporate Tax Cuts Increase Income Inequality." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 18-101, May 2018. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan. "The Accounting Rookie Job Market: A Practitioner's Guide." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 18-008, July 2017. View Details
- Khan, Urooj, Suresh Nallareddy, and Ethan Rouen. "The Role of Taxes in the Disconnect Between Corporate Performance and Economic Growth." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 18-006, July 2017. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan. "Rethinking Measurement of Pay Disparity and its Relation to Firm Performance." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 18-007, July 2017. View Details
- Cases and Teaching Materials
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- Serafeim, George, and Ethan Rouen. "Redefining Mogul." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 121-030, October 2020. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan. "Employee Activism (A) and (B)." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 121-031, September 2020. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan. "TJX Instructor Exercise." Harvard Business School Spreadsheet Supplement 120-117, June 2020. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan. "Income Inequality and the CEO Pay Ratio at TJX Cos." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 120-116, May 2020. View Details
- Serafeim, George, Ethan Rouen, and Sarah Gazzaniga. "Redefining Mogul." Harvard Business School Case 120-043, March 2020. (Revised May 2020.) View Details
- Serafeim, George, Ethan Rouen, and David Freiberg. "SK Group: Social Progress Credits." Harvard Business School Teaching Plan 120-112, May 2020. View Details
- Serafeim, George, Ethan Rouen, and David Freiberg. "SK Group: Social Progress Credits." Harvard Business School Case 120-071, January 2020. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Akari Furukawa. "Employee Activism (B)." Harvard Business School Supplement 120-105, March 2020. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Akari Furukawa. "Employee Activism." Harvard Business School Case 120-104, March 2020. View Details
- Di Maggio, Marco, Ethan Rouen, and George Serafeim. "Facebook's Libra: The Privatization of Money?" Harvard Business School Teaching Note 220-048, December 2019. (Revised February 2021.) View Details
- Di Maggio, Marco, Ethan Rouen, George Serafeim, and Aldo Sesia. "Facebook's Libra: The Privatization of Money?" Harvard Business School Case 120-021, October 2019. (Revised February 2021.) View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Akari Furukawa. "Income Inequity and Income Inequality." Harvard Business School Background Note 120-062, December 2019. (Revised October 2020.) View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Akari Furukawa. "Income Inequality and the CEO Pay Ratio at TJX Cos." Harvard Business School Case 120-063, December 2019. (Revised May 2020.) View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Susanna Gallani. "Tapping Growth at Lord Hobo PowerPoint Supplement." Harvard Business School PowerPoint Supplement 120-708, October 2019. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Susanna Gallani. "Tapping Growth at Lord Hobo Brewing Company Spreadsheet Supplement (Instructor)." Harvard Business School Spreadsheet Supplement 120-707, October 2019. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Susanna Gallani. "Tapping Growth at Lord Hobo Brewing Company Spreadsheet Supplement (Student)." Harvard Business School Spreadsheet Supplement 120-706, October 2019. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Susanna Gallani. "Tapping Growth at Lord Hobo Brewing Company." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 120-023, September 2019. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan C., and Charles C.Y. Wang. "Measuring Impact at JUST Capital." Harvard Business School Case 119-092, March 2019. (Revised April 2019.) View Details
- Rouen, Ethan. "Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing at Voray." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 119-077, February 2019. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Susanna Gallani. "Tapping Growth at Lord Hobo Brewing Company." Harvard Business School Case 119-028, August 2018. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Suraj Srinivasan. "JOE & THE JUICE Crosses the Atlantic (with video links)." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 118-075, March 2018. View Details
- Rouen, Ethan, and Suraj Srinivasan. "JOE & THE JUICE Crosses the Atlantic (with video link)." Harvard Business School Multimedia/Video Case 118-039, November 2017. (Revised June 2019.) View Details
- Research Summary
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- Teaching
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Professor Rouen teaches the Elective Curriculum course Reimaging Capitalism.
- Awards & Honors
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Winner of the 2018 Best Dissertation Award from the Financial Accounting and Reporting Section of the American Accounting Association for "Rethinking Measurement of Pay Disparity and Its Relation to Firm Performance" (Ph.D. diss., Columbia Business School, 2017).Winner of the 2017 Deloitte Foundation Wildman Medal from the American Accounting Association for “Financial Statement Irregularities: Evidence from the Distributional Properties of Financial Statement Numbers” (Review of Accounting Studies, 2015) with Dan Amiram and Zahn Bozanic.Received a 2016 Werner L. and Adriana Chilton Doctoral Fellowship from Columbia Business School.Selected as a Finalist for the 2015 Columbia University Presidential Teaching Award.Received the 2015 Third-Year Best Student Award from Columbia Business School.Received a 2015 Institute of Management Accountants Doctoral Student Grant.Selected as a 2015 Doctoral Fellow by the W. Edwards Deming Center for Quality, Productivity, and Competitiveness at Columbia Business School.Selected as a 2015 AAA/Deloitte/J. Michael Cook Doctoral Consortium Fellow by the American Accounting Association.Received a 2015 Paul and Sandra Montrone Doctoral Fellowship from Columbia Business School.Received a 2015 Deloitte Foundation Doctoral Fellowship.Winner of the 2014 Midyear Meeting Best Paper Award from the American Accounting Association, Financial Accounting and Reporting Section for “Financial Statement Irregularities: Evidence from the Distributional Properties of Financial Statement Numbers” (Review of Accounting Studies, 2015) with Dan Amiram and Zahn Bozanic.
- Additional Information
- Areas of Interest
- In The News
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