1. Introduction
In this paper we investigate whether earnings quality varies systematically with political connections in a wide sample
of countries and politically connected firms. Overall, our results reveal that the presence of political connections is
associated with a lower quality of accounting earnings. We document that political connections have incremental
explanatory power beyond country, regulatory, and firm-specific ownership characteristics.
Ex-ante, one could have argued that because connected firms are subject to extensive controls and monitoring (including
scrutiny by the media), political connections would, in fact, be associated with better earnings quality. This, however, is not the
case. Based on the results in prior research, three explanations are consistent with our finding that the quality of earnings of
politically connected firms is poorer than the quality of earnings of similar non-connected peers. First, as politically connected
firms typically derive gains from their connections1 over and above the payments they make,2 insiders may hide, obscure, or at