UC Berkeley

This dissertation examines the motivations that lead some firms to lobby against the proposed change in accounting for leases. There are at least three distinct motivations for a company to lobby against the proposed change: a high perceived cost of implementation, a belief that the change will increase the cost of capital, and the

management's desire to avoid incurring any personal costs associated with the change (i.e. an increase in workload). My research suggests that companies that engage in lobbying are concerned with the costs of implementing such changes (renegotiation of debt covenants, an increase in auditor fees, the replacement of IT systems, etc.), but companies also seem to be motivated by the desire of accounting managers to avoid any additional eort that the change would require.