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Also consistent with industry equilibrium models—and certain partial- equilibrium models—we find that financial structure, technology, and risk are simultaneously determined. Accounting for this simultaneity affects the economic significance and nature of the relations we document between financial leverage, capital–labor ratios, cash-flow volatility, and the determinants of these variables.
Our research has practical implications for future research. First, we show that simple measures of a firm’s position within its industry help us under- stand how firms choose financial structure. These measures are easy to construct and economically significant. Second, our research supports the proposition that benchmarks should be created on multiple within-industry measures—along both real and financial variables—rather than just relying on single measures such as industry dummies, or industry means or medians.
Overall, our evidence shows that industry factors help explain firm financial structure, the diversity of firms that populate industries, and the simultaneity of real and financial decisions. We conclude that depar- tures from the mean industry financial structure are systematically related to technology and risk choices relative to the industry. When firms depart from industry norms for financial structure, they also systematically depart along technology and risk dimensions.
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