This paper analyses the relation between authority and incentives. It extends the standard principal--agent model by a project selection stage in which the principal can either delegate the choice of project to the agent or keep the authority. The agent's subsequent choice of effort depends both...

In an observational learning environment, rational agents with incomplete information may mimic the actions of their predecessors even when their own signal suggests the opposite. This herding behaviour may lead the society to an inefficient outcome if the signals of the early movers happen to...

We examine a model in which the public is unsure about the competence of a politician, and whether they are concerned about the long-term consequences of their decisions (statesman) or about the public’s opinion concerning their competence and preferences (populist). The main finding suggests...

The delegation of monetary policy to a supranational Central Bank creates a conflict of interest between residents of different countries. For example, the country in recession favours more inflation to boost output, while the country in boom prefers exactly the opposite. This conflict gives...

In this paper we analyse how the creation of a single currency regime changes the strategic relationship between policy-makers, both within and across countries. In particular we look at the role of cross-country externalities and lack of commitment. When labour taxation is excessive, due to...

This Paper analyses the optimal timing of taxes on capital income. We show that the celebrated result that taxes should front-loaded with an initially high tax followed by a discrete jump to the steady state is knife-edge, hinging on capital having a constant depreciation rate. An empirically...

We completely characterize the set of second-best optimal "menus" of student-loan contracts in a simple economy with risky labour-market outcomes, adverse selection, moral hazard and risk aversion. The model combines structured student loans and an elementary optimal income-tax problem à la...

Bailing out banks requires overcoming debt overhang as well as dealing with adverse selection with respect to the quality of banks' balance sheets, in terms of heterogeneity in both the likelihood and extent of their potential shortfalls, of future asset values vis-à-vis contractual debt...

An upstream firm can license its innovation to downstream firms that have to exert further development effort. There are situations in which more licenses are sold if effort is a hidden action. Moral hazard may thus increase the probability that the product will be developed.

We compare competitive equilibrium outcomes with and without trading by a privately informed 'monopolistic' insider, in a model with real investment portfolio choices ex ante, and noise trading generated by aggregate uncertainty regarding other agents' intertemporal consumption preferences. The...