This paper shows how fixed costs can play an important role in determining the structure of organizations. Applications considered include layoffs, downsizing, heterogeneity among firms, and the structure of hierarchies. Agency problems as a source of fixed costs are also considered.

Conviction rates in Japan exceed 99 percent -- why? On the one hand, because Japanese prosecutors are badly understaffed they may prosecute only their strongest cases and present judges only with the most obviously guilty defendants. On the other, because Japanese judges can be reassigned by the...

In this paper we explain the prevalence of explicit contracts of employment, particularly those that embody high- rather than low-powered incentives and clauses that supersede the common law defaults. Our analysis is based on an understanding of two fundamental problems that arise when agency...

We use new firm-level data to examine the effects of spinoffs and privatization on corporate performance in a rapidly emerging market economy. Unlike the existing literature, which analyzes spinoffs almost exclusively in advanced economies, we control for accompanying ownership changes and the...

This essay brings fiscal federalism theory into contact with the knowledge perspective to economic organization. The question addressed is: can a central government be justified in the context of fiscal federalism on grounds of economic organization? We point out that if one looks at the...

Software is a potentially excludable public good. It is possible, at some cost, to exclude non-paying users from its consumption by using copyright law or technological restraints. Licensing the software under proprietary license terms makes of it a private good, licensing it under the BSD does...

Collusion and soft budget constraint are two conspicuous phenomena in transition economies¡¯ banking system. Literature has separately investigated those two phenomena from theoretical point of views. However, the cross-point of both phenomena has been neglected in the research of banking...

This paper presents a model of trust in which a principal chooses either to trust or monitor an agent who, in turn, chooses either to honor or exploit that trust. The principal's decision of whether to trust or monitor is based on the relative temptation an agent faces to exploit the principal's...

Computers have greatly improved the lives of economists. Computer networks may dramatically change the way we work. Already we have seen hints with electronic mail, mailing lists, on-line card catalogs, access to U.S. government data, and the start of an on-line working paper culture (nearly...