Meet MArk J. Roe

Mark J. Roe is the David Berg Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, where he teaches courses on corporate law, corporate finance, and corporate bankruptcy. Much of his research investigates how political forces shape, and are shaped by, the large corporation. The final chapters of Missing the Target: Why Stock Market Short-Termism Is Not the Problem do the same, pointing to why it’s politically convenient for key groups and leaders to assess stock market short-termism as more pernicious than it is.

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Mark J. Roe uses economy-wide data on R&D spending trends and corporate financial analysis to show that stock-market short-termism is not the root of all of America’s economic problems. The book shows that blaming short-termism overlooks the real causes of declining investment, R&D cutbacks,
environmental deterioration, and workplace conflict. By pointing to other sources of tension like accelerating technology change, policy uncertainty, and an increasing sense of workplace insecurity, Missing the Target argues for a more nuanced understanding of the challenges to the American economy.
Roe also disproves many of the core claims against short-termism by demonstrating that R&D spending is not in a complete decline. In fact, while government research spending may be down, corporate R&D expenditure is actually rising faster than the economy is growing.