Finance and Financial Management Commons^™

The Association Between Corporate Governance And Audit Fees, Cindy K. Harris

Business and Economics Faculty Publications

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (“SOX”) established not only corporate governance reform but also legislated significant changes to the practice of auditing publicly held corporations. Rules implemented by the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) further reinforced stronger corporate governance standards. The effect of these reforms on the cost of public audits is indisputable: the initial rise in audit fees was dramatic as corporations complied with the new provisions. This paper examines the relationship between corporate governance characteristics and audit fees for a random sample of 100 publicly traded corporations drawn from the 2005 Fortune 500 list. The data is obtained …