Single CEOs, Bigger Risk Takers than Married CEOs

It is also possible that married CEOs prefer less risk and not exactly that single CEOs are willing to go for a higher risk. And in a general sense, single people would not like to go for higher risk while compared to a married couple.

It is also possible that a marriage completely changed the usefulness of wealth in terms or needs and wants, by combining the preferences of the spouse into the CEO’s objective function.

For example, a CEO who has to support a spouse and children may have a higher required level of consumption expenditure and therefore income. This would make married CEOs electively more risk-averse than single ones for reasons that have nothing to do with status. However, under rational expectations the possibility of getting married in the future should apex one's decisions even prior to getting married, and therefore it is ambiguous whether their marriage itself would have an effect on CEO risk taking.