"Community governance" is the set of small group social interactions that, with market and state, determine economic outcomes. We argue (i) community governance addresses some common market and state failures but typically relies on insider--outsider distinctions that may be morally repugnant...

The Walrasian general equilibrium model is the centrepiece of modern economic theory, but progress in understanding its dynamical properties has been meagre. This article shows that the instability of Walras' tâtonnement process is due to the public nature of prices, which leads to excessive...

We investigate the manner in which a desire to emulate the rich influences individuals' allocation of time between labour and leisure, greater inequality inducing longer work hours as a result. Data on work hours in ten countries over the period 1963-98 show that greater inequality is indeed...

We study the impact of reputational incentives in markets characterised by moral hazard problems. Social preferences have been shown to enhance contract enforcement in these markets, while at the same time generating considerable wage and price rigidity. Reputation powerfully amplifies the...

In this paper, the authors report the results of a series of efficiency wage experiments. Some of the key predictions of the efficiency wage hypothesis are qualitatively confirmed by the data: higher wages caused a reduction in shirking; firms offered contracts which exhibited positive job...