Make Versus Buy in Trucking: Asset Ownership, Job Design, and Information
Explaining patterns of asset ownership is a central goal of both organizational economics and industrial organization. We develop a model of asset ownership in trucking, which we test by examining how the adoption of different classes of on-board computers (OBCs) between 1987 and 1997 influenced whether shippers use their own trucks for hauls or contract with for-hire carriers. We find that OBCs' incentive-improving features pushed hauls toward private carriage, but their resource-allocation-improving features pushed them toward for-hire carriage. We conclude that ownership patterns in trucking reflect the importance of both incomplete contracts and of job design and measurement issues.
Year of publication: |
2003
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Authors: | Baker, George P. ; Hubbard, Thomas N. |
Published in: |
American Economic Review. - American Economic Association - AEA. - Vol. 93.2003, 3, p. 551-572
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Publisher: |
American Economic Association - AEA |
Saved in:
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