This paper investigates the extent of the holdup underinvestment problem in a buyer-seller relationship in which the seller has private information about his alternative trading opportunities. Theory predicts that, compared with a situation in which outside options are publicly observed, the...

This paper investigates the extent of the holdup underinvestment problem in a buyer-seller relationship in which the seller has private information about his alternative trading opportunities. Theory predicts that, compared with a situation in which outside options are publicly observed, the...

This paper studies the design of tax systems that implement a planner's second-best allocation in a market economy. An example shows that the widely used Mirrleesian (1976) tax system cannot implement all incentive-compatible allocations. Hammond's (1979) "principle of taxation" proves that any...

Labor market theories allowing for search frictions make marked predictions on the effect of the degree of frictions on wages. Often, the effect is predicted to be negative. Despite the popularity of these theories, this has never been tested. We perform tests with matched worker-firm data. The...

We analyse a model of equilibrium directed search in a large labour market. Each worker, observing the wages posted at all vacancies, makes a fixed, finite number of applications, a. We allow for the possibility of ex post competition should more than one vacancy want to hire the same worker....

Tax Liability Side Equivalence (tax LSE) claims that the statutory incidence of a tax is irrelevant for its economic incidence. In gift-exchange labor markets, firms provide a gift to workers by paying high wages, and workers reciprocate by providing high efforts. Tax LSE is theoretically...

This discussion paper has resulted in a publication in the <A href="http://aa4pq3kw5l.search.serialssolutions.com/directLink?&atitle=Economics%3A%20An%20Emerging%20Small%20World&author=Sanjeev%20Goyal%3B%20Marco%20J%20van%20der%20Leij%3B%20José%20Luis%20Moraga%2DGonzález&issn=00223808&title=The%20Journal%20of%20Political%20Economy&volume=114&issue=2&date=20060401&spage=403&id=doi:&sid=ProQ_ss&genre=article&lang=en">'Journal of Political Economy'</A>.<P>This paper examines the small world hypothesis. The first part of the paper presents empirical evidence on the evolution of a particular world: the world of journal publishing economists during the period...</p></a>

We analyze the implications of multiple applications by job seekers for the microfoundations of the matching function. We emphasize a coordination failure caused by multiple applications, namely, that firms can waste resources processing applicants who are ultimately hired elsewhere.<P>This...</p>

This discussion paper resulted in an article in the 'Economic Journal (2007). Volume 117, issue 522, pages 1025-1050.<P> One of the main findings of a large body of gift exchange experiments is that in an incomplete contracts environment workers on average do not shirk and usually provide more than...</p>

Standard economic theory predicts that firms will not invest in general training and will underinvest in specific training. Empirical evidence, however, indicates that firms do invest in general training of their workers. Evidence from laboratory experiments points to less underinvestment in...