Relationship between cost stickiness and Social responsibility of manufacturing firms listed in the Tehran Stock Exchange

The goal of this research is to investigate the relationship between cost stickiness and corporate social responsibility (CSR) of manufacturing firms listed in the Tehran Stock Exchange. Financial performance is essential issue for firms and one of the important measures to control costs and increase profitability is recognition of behavior cost in response to changes in activity levels. At the same time CSR involvement requires costs. So be aware of how to handle the costs associated with CSR involvement to changes in the level of activity is important information for management decision. The data of 111 manufacturing companies during 10 years from 2005 to 2014 were collected and analyzed. To measure CSR, data envelopment analysis using DEA Solver software is used and to test hypothesis, the regression models and Eviews software were used. The research results show that is a significant positive relationship between CSR and cost stickiness and this positive relationship is related to cost of goods sold (CGS). Also the differences in the structure of CGS positively change the relationship between cost stickiness and CSR significantly. So that whatever the share of variable costs are less than fixed costs in the structure of CGS, it intensify positive relationship between cost stickiness and CSR.