Little is known about the relationship between family firms and their employees. This paper aims to close this gap. We distinguish between family management and family ownership as two dimensions of family firms and analyze their respective influence on downsizing. Our findings show that family...

This paper examines pecuniary aspects of work during unusual hours based on the German Time Use Data for 2001/02. The findings show positive wage premia of 9 - 10 percent for shift workers and men who work during unusual hours. There is some evidence of negative selection which suggests that men...

The relationship between CEO pay and performance has been much analyzed in the management and economics literature. This study analyzes the structure of executive compensation in family and non-family firms. In line with predictions of agency theory, it is found that the share of base salary is...

A large body of literature explains the inferior position of unskilled workers by imposing a structural shift in the labor force skill composition. This paper takes a different approach by emphasizing the connection between cyclical variations in skilled and unskilled labor markets. Using a...

Let (X1, Y1), . . ., (Xn, Yn) be i.i.d. rvs and let l(x) be the unknown p-quantile regression curve of Y on X. A quantile-smoother ln(x) is a localised, nonlinear estimator of l(x). The strong uniform consistency rate is established under general conditions. In many applications it is necessary...

This paper analyzes the problem of optimal job design when there is only one contractible and imperfect performance measure for all tasks whose contribution to firm value is non-verifiable. I find that task splitting is optimal when relational contracts based on firm value are not feasible. By...

An advisor is supposed to recommend a financial product in the best interest of her client. However, the best product for the client may not always be the product yielding the highest commission to the advisor. Do advisors nevertheless provide truthful advice? If not, will a voluntary or...

The market for retail financial products (e.g. investment funds or insurance) is marred by information asymmetries. Clients are not well informed about the quality of these products. They have to rely on the recommendations of advisors. Incentives of advisors and clients may not be aligned, when...

We study the effects of envy on the feasibility of relational contracts in a standard moral hazard setup with two agents. Performance is evaluated via an observable, but non-contractible signal which reflects the agent's individual contribution to firm value. Both agents exhibit disadvantageous...

We analyze the optimal combination of promotion tournaments and individual performance pay in an employment relationship. An agent's effort is non-observable and he has private information about his suitability for promotion. We find that the principal does not provide individual incentives if...