Economists have often argued that "pay for performance" is the optimal compensation scheme. However, use of the simplest form of pay for performance, the piece rate, has been in decline in manufacturing in recent decades. We show both theoretically and empirically that these changes are due to...

During the last 150 years, shoe manufacturing in the U.S. has gone from one of the largest employers in manufacturing to one of the smallest, yet some firms have survived and remained profitable. This study examines the role of changing methods of compensation in shoe manufacturing, in a sector...