In this paper, a formal rent-seeking theory of the firm is developed. The main idea is that integration (compared to non-integration) facilitates rent-seeking for the integrating party, but makes it harder for the integrated one. In a one-period model, this implies that the rent-seeking contest...

We address the question how much authority a principal should delegate to a manager with conflicting interests and uncertain ability in a context in which the manager has both compensationbased and reputational incentives. The optimal level of authority balances the value of the manager's...

We study infinitely repeated two player games with perfect information, where each period consists of two stages: one in which the parties simultaneously choose an action and one in which they can transfer money to each other. We first derive simple conditions that allow a constructive...

Europe is reorganizing its international value chain. I document these changes in Europe's international organization of production with new survey data of Austrian and German firms investing in Eastern Europe. I show estimates of the share of intrafirm trade between Austria or Germany on the...

Is the reputation of a firm tradable when the change in ownership is observable? We consider a competitive market in which a share of owners must retire in each period. New owners bid for the firms that are for sale. Customers learn the owner's type, which reflects the quality of the good or...

This paper examines the efficiency of expectation damages as a breach remedy in a bilateral trade setting with renegotiation and relationship-specific investment by the buyer and the seller. As demonstrated by Edlin and Reichelstein (1996), no contract that specifies only a fixed quantity and a...

This paper studies the impact of innovation on the organizational structure. The theoretical framework predicts that a larger parental pool of knowledge raises the probability of offshoring. This holds in a national as well as an international context. However, when the producer loses...

Consider a two-product firm that decides on the quality of each product. Product quality is unknown to consumers. If the firm sells both products under the same brand name, consumers adjust their beliefs about quality subject to the performance of both products. We show that if the probability...

Who does, and who should initiate costly certification by a third party under asymmetric quality information, the buyer or the seller? Our answer '€" the seller '€" follows from a non-trivial analysis revealing a clear intuition. Buyer-induced certification acts as an inspection device,...

I study intermediation in networked markets using a stochastic model of multilateral bargaining in which traders compete on different routes through the network. I characterize stationary equilibrium payoffs as the fixed point of a set of intuitive value function equations and study efficiency...