Working Paper
Initial Luck, Status-Seeking and Snowballs Lead to Corporate Success and Failure
Amihai Glazer, Vesa Kanniainen, Panu Poutvaara
CESifo, Munich, 2004
CESifo Working Paper No. 1216
CESifo, Munich, 2004
CESifo Working Paper No. 1216
Corporate success stories often resemble a snowball. We show how initial luck in hiring talented people, the resulting technological advantage, superior corporate culture, and status-seeking by workers and by consumers can make small initial differences generate large differences over time.
Keywords: industry equilibrium, initial luck, status effects, snowball