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Testing the
Testing the pecking order theory: pecking order
the importance of methodology theory
Dimitrios Vasiliou
Hellenic Open University, Patra, Greece 85
Nikolaos Eriotis
National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece, and
Nikolaos Daskalakis
Athens University of Economics and Business, Athens, Greece

Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to show that different methodologies may lead to different
implications about the validity of the pecking order theory.
Design/methodology/approach – Using data from Greek firms as a starting-point, the paper first
investigates whether they follow the financing pattern implied by the pecking order theory and then
illustrates that conclusions concerning the pecking order should be carefully shaped by researchers, as
the methodology used can be misleading. Two different information sources are used; the first is data
derived from the financial statements of the Greek firms listed in the Athens Exchange, while the
second comprises the answers to a detailed questionnaire.
Findings – It is shown that a negative relationship between leverage and profitability does not
necessarily mean that the pecking order financing hierarchy holds. Analysis should not rely solely on
the mean-oriented regression quantitative analysis to test the pecking order theory, as it refers to a
distinct hierarchy.
Research limitations/implications – Further research should focus on investigating the reasons
that underlie actual firm financing.
Practical implications – The fact that the pecking order is actually a hierarchy makes research in
this field more complex. Analysts should consider this special feature of the pecking order approach
when analyzing the existence of the pecking order financing pattern. The methodology followed is of
crucial importance in the analysis of the existence of the pecking order financing pattern.
Originality/value – To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper to test the pecking order
pattern of financing using simultaneously quantitative and qualitative data, and to compare results
and conclusions drawn from these two different types of methodology.
Keywords Capital structure, Research methods, Financing, Greece
Paper type Technical paper

Introduction
Effective management of the financing procedure is vital for the financial welfare of the
firm. Firms manage their capital structure carefully. A false decision on capital
structure may lead to financial distress and, eventually, to bankruptcy. However, the
optimal combination of the various financing sources has been a controversial topic Qualitative Research in Financial
since its theoretical rise and the empirical investigations that have followed. So far, no Markets
Vol. 1 No. 2, 2009
exact formula exists to determine the optimal debt policy for a particular firm. pp. 85-96
Nevertheless, numerous theoretical approaches have been developed to analyze the q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1755-4179
impact of alternative capital structures. These methods can be distinguished in two DOI 10.1108/17554170910975900
QRFM distinct groups that prevail in capital structure theory: the pecking order theory and
1,2 the debt costs-benefits trade-off approach.
This paper shows that the methodology used to draw conclusions on the issue of the
pecking order theory is very important. Using corporate data from Greek firms, we
examine whether they follow the financing pattern implied by the pecking order theory
and demonstrate that conclusions based on quantitative analysis alone should be
86 carefully drawn when testing the pecking order financing application. Several authors
conclude that the predictions of the pecking order model are accurate on the basis of an
inverse relationship existing between profitability and leverage. However, this
negative relationship simply shows that internal funds are preferred to debt. This may
mean that pecking order exists but it does not prove that it actually does. For the
pecking order pattern to hold, debt should also be preferred to new equity, a hypothesis
that remains yet to be proven.
We use Greek corporate data in our analysis. We start with a discussion of Vasiliou
et al. (2005) who find that firms generally finance their activities according to the
financing procedure implied by the pecking order theory, but based on the result that
profitability is negatively related to leverage. In this paper, we investigate this
“indication” by thoroughly examining if pecking order theory does exist in capital
structures of Greek firms. We use two different sources of information. The first refers
to the data used in the empirical analysis of Vasiliou et al. (2005), derived from the
financial statements of the Greek firms listed on the Athens Exchange (ATHEX)
during the period 1997-2001, which we extend to December 2002, to match the second
set of data period. The second set of data consists of the answers to a detailed
questionnaire that was sent to all Greek firms listed in the ATHEX. The questionnaire
was filled in and sent back during the period of 1 October 2002 until 31 January 2003.
To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper to test the pecking order pattern of
financing using simultaneously quantitative and qualitative data, and to compare
results and conclusions drawn from these two different types of methodology.
The paper is organized as follows. In the next section, we review some of the
theoretical and empirical literature concerning the pecking order theory. In section
third, we test for statistical differences between the two samples. In section four, we
briefly refer to the results and conclusions of the analysis conducted by Vasiliou et al.
and we isolate the variable regarding the pecking order theory. In this section,
we investigate whether firms prefer internal to external financing. In the fifth section,
we focus more deeply on the firms’ financing preferences by analyzing the answers to
the questionnaires. The results are summarised in the last section.

Pecking order theory and corporate financing pattern

We track the infancy of the pecking order hypothesis in Donaldson’s (1961) study.
Donaldson (1961, p. 57) studied the financing practices of a sample of large
corporations and observed that “Management strongly favored internal generation as
a source of new funds even to the exclusion of external funds except for occasional
bulges in the need for funds.” In case external capital was needed, managers generally
avoided to issue new stock:
Though few companies would go so far to rule out a sale of common under any
circumstances, the large majority had not had such a sale in the past 20 years and did not
anticipate one in the foreseeable future. This was particularly remarkable in view of the very
 high Price-Earnings ratios of recent years. Several financial officers showed that they were Testing the
well aware that this had been a good time to sell common, but the reluctance still persisted
(Donaldson, 1961, pp. 57-8). pecking order
The initial conclusion of Donaldson was analysed later by Myers (1984) and Myers and
theory
Majluf (1984) who reached the following conclusion about the hierarchy of financing
choices: firms will first rely on internally generated funds (i.e. undistributed earnings),
then they will turn to debt if additional funds are needed and finally they will issue 87
equity to cover any remaining capital requirements.
There are two main rationales that have been advanced as explanations of this
pattern in preferences:
(1) external financing transaction costs; and
(2) asymmetric information theory.

According to the first set of arguments, transaction costs associated with obtaining
new external financing play an important role in a firm’s capital structure decisions.
Internal funds do not bear any transaction (or flotation) costs. Furthermore, the total
transaction costs of new debt are typically lower than the total costs of obtaining other
new external financing (Emery and Finnerty, 1997, p. 481). Lee et al. (1996) calculated
the average flotation costs for debt and equity in the 1990s using information from the
Securities Data Company. They found that flotation costs for common stock are more
than twice as high as those of new debt for all levels of amounts of capital raised.
According to the asymmetric information theory, internal financing avoids the
scrutiny of suppliers of capital. If additional funds are needed then debt is preferred
because debt issues are regarded as a positive signal by investors who possess less
information than managers. This conclusion (and empirical finding) is based on the
belief that management will never issue an undervalued security. Thus, if debt is
issued, investors will assume that management believes that the stock is undervalued.
Furthermore, according to Myers (1984, p. 584) under the asymmetric information
theory, the pecking order pattern implies that the firm should “[. . .] issue the safest
possible securities – strictly speaking, securities whose future value changes least
when the manager’s inside information is revealed to the market”. The order is based
on value volatility, the favoured source being the least volatile, therefore leaving the
order of preferences (or “pecking order”) as: retained earnings; new debt; new equity.
An obvious implication of the pecking order theory is that highly profitable firms
that generate high earnings are expected to use less debt capital than those that are not
very profitable. Several researchers have tested the effects of profitability on firm
leverage. Kester (1986) and Friend and Lang (1988) conclude that there is a
significantly negative relationship between profitability and debt/asset ratios. Rajan
and Zingales (1995) and Wald (1999) find a significantly negative relationship between
profitability and debt/asset ratios for the USA, the UK and Japan. The Greek market
does not seem to be an exception. Vasiliou et al. (2005) also find a negative relationship
between profitability and debt ratios.
However, the inverse relationship between profitability and leverage does not prove
the existence of the pecking order theory. Rather, they provide an implication that
pecking order may exist. Specifically, this inverse relationship shows that internal
funds are preferred to debt. However, this does not mean that debt is preferred from
new equity. Firms with high profitability may prefer internal financing to debt, but
QRFM how do they rank debt and new equity? The inverse relationship between profitability
1,2 and debt ratios does not provide an unambiguous answer to this question.
The empirical accuracy of the pecking order model has been the focus of several
researchers in recent years. Ever since Shyam-Sunder and Myers (1999) found support
for the theory, there have been numerous studies that question the existence of the
pecking order financing pattern. For example, Chirinko and Singha (2000) show that
88 the empirical evidence of Shyam-Sunder and Myers (1999) may generate misleading
inferences when evaluating plausible patterns of external financing. Frank and Goyal
(2003) test the pecking order theory of corporate leverage and provide evidence that
contrary to the pecking order theory, net equity issues track the financing deficit more
closely than do net debt issues. Bancel and Mittoo (2004) find only weak support for
the pecking order theory, while Fama and French (2005) show that financing decisions
seem to violate the central predictions of the pecking order model about how often and
under what circumstances firms issue equity. Galpin (2004) claims that the pecking
order does not describe the way that managers access external capital. On the other
hand, there are a number of recent studies that are supportive of a pecking order.
Lemmon and Zender (2002) denote that the theory appears to be a good description of
the financing policies of a large sample of firms, while DeMiguel and Pindado (2000)
and Graham and Harvey (2001) also provide some support. Leary and Roberts (2008)
show that approximately 36 per cent of their sample firms adhere to the pecking
order’s prediction of issuing debt before equity. Nevertheless, it seems that
the existence of the pecking order pattern of financing still remains an ambiguous
issue.
Testing the pecking order model’s predictions robustly is not an easy empirical
task. The difficulty lies in the fact that the model suggests a hierarchy of financing
sources. Thus, it is this hierarchy that needs to be checked to prove that the pecking
order exists. As already mentioned, a simple negative inverse relationship between
leverage and profitability provides an implication rather than a proof that the pecking
order exists.

Examination of sample differences

In this study, we use two different sets of data, derived from two different samples.
These two samples come from the same population, which consists of the 331 Greek
firms listed in the ATHEX (on 30 September 2002). Thus, the first sample (denoted as
sample 1) contains 107 firms from the total population and the second sample (denoted
as sample 2) consists of 89 firms. To draw safe conclusions based on the simultaneous
examination of these two different samples, we first need to prove that both samples
are (statistically) representative of the total population.
We use the x 2 goodness-of-fit test to examine whether both samples are representative
of the population based on the capital structure criterion. The procedure is the
following: We first calculate the annual long-term debt to equity ratio (i.e. the capital
structure ratio) of each firm listed on the ATHEX[1]. This ratio is the mean for
comparison. We then tile the long-term leverage of the firms in brackets (Table I).
Next, we test if there are statistically significant differences between the population
of all listed firms and our two samples. Our null hypothesis is that there are no
differences between these long-term leverage brackets. Thus, we frame our two-tailed
hypotheses as follows:
 Testing the
Population Sample 1 Sample 2
% Brackets % Brackets % Brackets pecking order
No long-term debt 41.09 136 44.76 47 41.18 35
theory
Up to 10% 26.28 87 20.98 24 24.71 21
11-20% 7.25 24 9.79 10 7.06 6
21-30% 7.55 25 9.09 11 8.24 7 89
31-50% 6.04 20 7.69 7 5.88 5
51-100% 7.25 24 6.99 8 7.06 6 Table I.
More than 100% 4.53 15 0.70 1 5.88 5 Population and sample
100 331 100 107 100 85 percentage brackets

H0 : p ¼ p
H1 : p – p
where p is population proportions and p is the sample proportions. The formula for
x 2 is:
Xk
½Oi 2 E i
2
x2 ¼
i¼1
Ei

where Oi is the observed number of cases falling in the ith category, Ei is the expected
number of cases falling in the ith category and k is the number of categories.
In our case, the observed number is the sample percentage of the long-term leverage
while the expected number is the respective population percentage. The long-term debt
to equity ratio brackets for the population and for both samples are presented in
Table I.
The results of the x 2 test are presented in Table II.
Applying the test, the x 2 values for samples 1 and 2 are 5.562 and 0.488,
respectively. To conclude whether these values lead to a rejection of our H0, we
examine where they lie in a x 2 distribution. To do so, we first calculate the total
degrees of freedom as follows: the total number of parameters in our model is 7, namely
the number of long-term debt to equity ratio brackets, from which we subtract 1,
because the expected frequencies in each of these brackets are not independent; thus
we have 6 degrees of freedom. The critical value of the x 2 distribution for 6 degrees of
freedom, assuming an a ¼ 0.05 level of significance, is 12.592. The calculated value
does not exceed the critical value, thus the H0 is not rejected. Hence, both samples
are representative of the population according to the capital structure criterion and the
conclusions based on the simultaneous examination of these two different samples can
be considered as reliable.

Sample 1 Sample 2
2
x 5.562 0.488
Degrees of freedom 6 6 Table II.
Critical value (a ¼ 0.05) 12.592 x 2 test results
QRFM External vs internal financing
1,2 In this section, we briefly refer to the findings of Vasiliou et al. (2005) and we then
isolate the variable that is directly related to the pecking order theory. The data they
used came from the financial statements published by 143 firms listed on the ATHEX
during the period 1997-2001. These data are included in the database of the ATHEX
market.
90 The authors used panel-data models combining the cross-sectional data with
time-series and estimated the following model for the Greek market:

DRi;t ¼ ai þ b1 ASi;t þ b2 SIZEi;t þ b3 PROFITi;t þ b4 DRi;t21 þ 1i;t

where: DRi,t ¼ the debt ratio of firm i at time t, ASi,t ¼ the asset structure of firm i at
time t, SIZEi,t ¼ the size of firm i at time t, PROFITi,t ¼ the profitability of firm i at
time t, DRi,t2 1 ¼ the debt ratio of firm i at time t 2 1 and 1i,t ¼ the error term.
The study considered the following three models to estimate the effect of each
independent variable on the debt ratio: the total model, the fixed effects model and the
random effects model. One of the key results[2] that emerged from the study was that a
negative relationship exists between profitability and debt ratios, leading to the
conclusion that firms that are more profitable use less debt, and thus the pecking order
theory seems to hold. In this paper, we further analyze this conclusion.
We extend the previous study’s database to December 2002 to match the
questionnaire period adopted here. The present study is concerned with analysing the
specific predictions of the pecking order theory, and so we isolate the PROFITi,t
variable and investigate the direct relationship between it and the debt ratio. The
following regression model is studied, with the results presented in Table III:

DRi;t ¼ ai þ b1 PROFITi;t þ 1i;t

The R 2 is 83 per cent and the F-statistic is high enough (3,133.471) so that the H0 that
the factor has no effect on the dependent variable is rejected (Prob.
F-statistic ¼ 0.000). We see that the statistically significant (at 99 per cent)
PROFITi,t variable is negatively related to the debt ratio. This means that firms that
are profitable use their internal funds (retained earnings) to finance their operations
and investments and thus they borrow relatively less than firms with low profitability.

Variable Coefficient SE t-statistic Prob.

C 0.515598 0.000402 1,283.2 0.0000

Profit 2 0.686659 0.003840 2178.8 0.0000
Weighted statistics
R2 0.830395 Mean dependent var. 7.966317
Adjusted R 2 0.830130 SD dependent var. 7.444337
SE of regression 3.068206 Sum squared resid. 6,024.888
F-statistic 3,133.471 Durbin-Watson stat. 0.891027
Prob. (F-statistic) 0.000000
Table III. Notes: Dependent variable: DR; Model: total; Method: GLS (cross-section weights); White
Regression of debt ratios Heteroskedasticity-consistent SE and covariance; GLS, generalized least squares; Prob., probability;
on profitability SD, standard deviation; SE, standard error
Thus, firms prefer internal financing from debt and this is an indication that pecking Testing the
order may exist. pecking order
theory
New debt versus new equity
The previous section reported that Greek firms appear to prefer internal financing to
debt. The question that arises next therefore relates to the relative preference for debt
over equity when external fund raising is undertaken. Unfortunately, the data derived 91
from the financial statements cannot provide an answer to this question. Instead, we
believe that the issue lends itself particularly well to qualitative analysis, in this case
by directly seeking the views of Greek firms’ financial managers. We therefore
generated a detailed questionnaire consisting of 24 questions relating to the issue of
financing choices.
Using questionnaires to test capital structure issues is a relatively new methodology
in corporate finance. Graham and Harvey (2001) were the first to provide an integrated
analysis for specific corporate finance issues (including capital structure) based on a
detailed US-based questionnaire. Bancel and Mittoo (2004) and Brounen et al. (2006)
replicate the study of Graham and Harvey (2001) for European firms and compare their
results to those of firms in the USA. Vasiliou and Daskalakis (2009) apply the same
methodology using a similar questionnaire and compare their findings for the Greek
market with those for the USA and Europe.
All listed firms in the ATHEX were asked to answer the questionnaire. Prior to
sending, it was tested by a panel of academic experts, resulting in minor adjustments
where necessary. The survey period lasted from 1 October 2002 until 31 January 2003.
Our main concern was to arrange appointments with the financial managers to fill in
the questionnaire during the appointment. In case the appointment could not be
arranged (usually due to the work-load of the financial managers), the questionnaire
was sent and then returned by e-mail, fax or mail.
Our sample consists of 89 firms, which represents 29.3 per cent of the population
(with banks and investment firms excluded). This response rate appears to be a good
one, if we bear in mind the response rates of corresponding surveys in other
countries[3]. Table IV presents some sample characteristics, regarding the firms’ size,
using the sales figure as a proxy, and the industry in which they operate.
Regarding the pecking order issue, there is a specific question in this questionnaire
that asks the firms to rank nine sources of capital (1 ¼ first choice, 9 ¼ last choice)
when they finance a new long-term investment project. The responses are summarised
in Table V.
Table V presents the average score for each source of financing and the number of
firms that chose each source as the first, second or third selection. Regarding the average
scores, bearing in mind that 1 stands for the first choice and 9 for the last, the lower the
mean, the more preferable the financing source. In addition to the mean score, we
included the three last columns of Table V to illustrate the hierarchical order in
responses, as this is the very essence of the pecking order theory. For the pecking order
theory to hold, firms should denote retained earnings as their first choice, long-term
bank loans (or new bond issues) as their second choice, with new stock issues coming
last.
Inspection of Table V reveals that retained earnings were ranked first as an
investment funding source by the financial managers (mean ¼ 3.33). Specifically,
QRFM
Survey sample (%)
1,2
Sales (million euro)
,25 40.96
25-99 33.73
100-499 20.48
92 500-999 2.41
1,000-4,999 2.41
.5,000 0.00
Industry
Retail and wholesale 15.66
Mining, construction 24.10
Manufacturing 15.66
Transportation, energy 3.61
Communication, media 12.05
Bank, finance, insurance 8.43
Tech (software, biotech, etc.) 9.64
Other 10.84
Table IV. Notes: “Other” includes the following sectors: chemicals (3 firms), health care (3), change of activity
Sample statistics (1), gaming (1), travel and leisure (1)

Mean First Second Third

Retained earnings 3.33 24 15 7

Long-term bank loan 3.55 17 9 18
New stock issue 3.70 16 11 13
Table V. New bond issue 4.27 6 18 3
Responses to the question New convertible bond issue 4.42 10 7 13
“How would you classify Savings from depreciation expenses 5.07 8 9 8
the following financing Short-term loan 5.21 3 11 6
sources in order to New preferred stock issue 5.62 2 3 9
finance a new investment
project?” Note: The ninth alternative was the category named “Other” which was not used by the respondents

24 firms picked retained earnings as the first source of financing their investments, the
highest number that appears anywhere in the table. This evidence implies that firms in
general prefer internal financing to externally raised funding.
At first glance, the answers of the respondents regarding external financing seem to
favour the pecking order theory; on average, firms seem to prefer raising new debt than
issuing new equity. However, use of the mean scores in isolation to test for the
existence of the pecking order potentially leads to a logical error when drawing
inferences from the findings. In particular, the mean scores also reflect the volatility of
the managers’ answers and what is therefore required as evidence regarding a genuine
pecking order is the hierarchy that each firm follows (rather than the average ranking
of the different sources across all sample firms). If a firm does follow the pecking order
pattern of financing, then it should finance its investments first with internal funds,
second with debt and third with new equity issues. Therefore, we need to test for
statistical differences between retained earnings and:
 .
new debt; and Testing the
.
new equity issues. pecking order
The results of a x 2 test of these propositions are provided in Table VI; these suggest theory
that there is no statistically significant difference between the number of firms that
highlighted retained earnings as their preferred source of finance and the number that
indicated long-term debt or new stock issue as being their first choice. 93
Even if there was a statistical significant difference between retained earnings as a first
choice and all other sources of funds, this would not necessarily mean that the
conventional pecking order does exist, as it simply just denotes that retained earnings are
preferred over alternatives sources; the ordering of debt and equity is not determined.
Thus, if the pecking order does exist, then, by definition, it can exist only for these
24 firms that chose retained earnings as a first choice. To test this hypothesis, we
isolated these firms and investigated which of the remaining sources they chose as
their second and third alternatives. Looking at the results, as summarised in Table VII,
it is evident that only one of the 24 firms selected long-term bank loans as their second
choice, whereas alternative whereas six firms denoted that their second alternative
would be a new stock issue.
The overall conclusion that can be reached on the basis of the above evidence is that
the pecking order theory does not seem to hold for the Greek firms. However, another
important insight that the analysis suggests is that methodological weaknesses may
lead to the drawing of inappropriate conclusions. These may arise because the pecking
order theory refers to a distinct hierarchy of the financing sources that has to be
carefully considered by researchers. As noted above, Chirinko and Singha (2000)
suggest that the empirical evidence in Shyam-Sunder and Myers (1999) may generate
misleading inferences when evaluating plausible patterns of external financing. Thus,
researchers must be extremely careful when analysing and drawing conclusions about
the pecking order theory.

Conclusions
In this paper, we have adopted two different methodologies to test the pecking order
theory. The most important conclusion that can be drawn from the analysis is that

Panel A Panel B
Observed N Expected N Residual Observed N Expected N Residual

Retained earnings as a
first choice 24 20.5 3.5 24 20 4.0
Long-term loan as a
first choice 17 20.5 23.5 16 20 24.0
Total 41 40
x2 1.195a 1.600a
Degrees of freedom 1 1
Probability 0.274 0.206
Notes: Panel A – retained earnings as a first choice vs long-term bank loan as a first choice; Panel B –
retained earnings as a first choice vs new stock issue as a first choice; a0 cells (0 per cent) have expected Table VI.
frequencies less than 5 x 2 test results
 1,2

94

financing
QRFM

Table VII.
Hierarchy of long term

chose retained earnings

bank loan and new stock
issue for those firms that

as their primary source of

Long-term bank loan New stock issue
Hierarchy Frequency % Valid % Cumulative % Frequency % Valid % Cumulative %

2 1 4.17 4.76 4.76 6 25.00 26.09 26.09

3 6 25.00 28.57 33.33 3 12.50 13.04 39.13
4 5 20.83 23.81 57.14 5 20.83 21.74 60.87
5 4 16.67 19.05 76.19 4 16.67 17.39 78.26
6 1 4.17 4.76 80.95 4 16.67 17.39 95.65
7 4 16.67 19.05 100.00 1 4.17 4.35 100.00
Valid 21 87.50 100.00 23 95.83 100.00
Missing 3 12.50 1 4.17
Total 24 100.00 24 100.00
researchers should be careful when drawing conclusions regarding the pecking order Testing the
pattern of financing, as different methodologies may lead to different conclusions. Two pecking order
different sources of information were employed to reach this standpoint. The first was
the data used in an earlier quantitative paper by Vasiliou et al. (2005), derived from the theory
financial statements of firms listed on the ATHEX during the period 1997-2001, which
we extended to December 2002. The second set of data consists of the answers to a
detailed questionnaire that was sent to all Greek firms listed on the ATHEX. The 95
questionnaire was filled in and sent back during the period of 1 October 2002 until 31
January 2003.
We have argued that the conclusion often drawn by researchers in this area,
whereby a negative relationship between profitability and leverage is used as support
for the pecking order pattern of financing choices, is questionable. The methodology
followed is of crucial importance in such analysis; the fact that the pecking order is
actually a three-level hierarchy means that research on the topic must be carefully
planned. Further research should focus on investigating the reasons that underlie
actual firm financing, but in the context of the evidence presented here that “average”
results can mask the precise ordering of alternative financing sources in the corporate
decision-making process.

Notes
1. Data are drawn from the ATHEX database, which contains the published financial
statements for all listed firms.
2. The random effects model did not generate any significant results. The total model and the
fixed effecsts model provided similar results that led to the conclusions discussed in the text.
3. Scott and Johnson (1982) report a response rate of 21.2 per cent, Pinegar and Wilbricht (1989)
a rate of 35.2 per cent, Graham and Harvey (2001) a rate of 9 per cent, Bancel and Mittoo
(2004) a rate of 12 per cent and Brounen et al. (2004, 2006) a rate of 5 per cent for similar
surveys.

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Corresponding author
Nikolaos Daskalakis can be contacted at: ndaskal@aueb.gr

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