We study a supply chain relationship in which the buyer outsources production of a component to the supplier. The buyer also produces a component and combines it with the supplier's input to yield the final output. The supplier can upgrade production of his input via costly innovation. Neither...

We analyze optimal contracts in a hierarchy consisting of a principal, a supervisor and an agent. The supervisor is either neutral or altruistic towards the agent, but his preferences are private information. In a model with two supervisor types, we find that the optimal contract may be very...

I consider a repeated principal-agent model with moral hazard, in which the agent has βδ-preferences, which are widely used to capture time-inconsistency. I analyze the case where the agent is sophisticated in the sense that he is fully aware of his inconsistent discounting. I characterize the...

We analyze the interaction of explicit and implicit contracts in a model with selfish and fair principals. Fair principals are willing to honor implicit agreements, selfish principals are not. We investigate a separating equilibrium in which principals reveal their type through the contract...

This paper investigates the effects of supervision and incentives on subjects’ performance and cheating behavior in a real effort task. With a sample of 540 participants in three different experiments, we investigated the interaction between motivation and monetary and social rewards, with and...

When managers are sufficiently guided by social preferences, incentive provision through an organizational mode based on informal implicit contracts may provide a cost-effective alternative to a more formal mode based on explicit contracts and active monitoring. This paper reports the results...

The career prospects of newly recruited employees differ substantially within an organization. The stars experience considerable growth in earnings; others can hardly maintain their entry salaries. This article sheds light on the mechanisms generating the observed heterogeneity in earnings...

There is ample empirical evidence indicating that a substantial fraction of the population exhibits social preferences. Recent work also shows that social preferences influence the effectiveness of incentives in labor relations. Hence, when making contracting decisions, employers should take...

French municipalities often contract out the provision of local public services to private companies, and regularly choose the same private operator for a range of different services. We develop a model of relational contracts that shows how this strategy may lead to better performance at lower...

A government agency wants an infrastructure-based public service to be provided. Our experimental study compares two different modes of provision. In a public–private partnership, the two tasks of building the infrastructure and operating it are delegated to one private contractor (a...