Renira Corinne Angeles

Biography

Renira is a PhD candidate in political economy. Her doctoral project examines the political causes and consequences of economic inequality with a focus on top income share and politics of top executive compensation across developed economies. The thesis exhibits three main findings; 1) across 17 OECD countries, controlling for firm size and economic variables, strength of labour moderates more significantly top executive compensations than current regulations on corporate governance, 2) while there are evidence that left parties moderate pre-tax top income distribution confirming the class-struggle theory, it lacks explanation on the effect of over time regulatory changes such as financialization and market liberalization on pre-tax top income distribution. Further, the connection of these policies to government partisanship is less explored. Using Swedish mircro and macro dataset on high income earners, I found that left governments have a conditional positive effect on pre-tax income at the top, 3) while top managers supporting Conservatives in the UK donate more in values during the sample period, the responsiveness to donate with respect to top executive compensation is higher for managers supporting Labour. The sensitivity is particularly high with respect to the value of stock options and restricted stocks granted. Hence, the ideological distribution with respect to (high) income increase is more scattered than assumed for a specific segment of economic elites. The findings help us understand the link between income and political strategies and motivations of rich individuals, and the difference between elite and median voter political behavior.

Research Interest

Political Economy.