Abstract: The fluctuations in incomes inherent in rural communities can be attenuated by reciprocal assistance. A model of reciprocal assistance based upon rational action and voluntary participation is presented. Individuals provide assistance only if the costs of so doing are outweighed by the...

We present an overview of models of long-term self-enforcing labour contracts in which risk sharing is the dominant motive for contractual solutions. A base model is developed which is sufficiently general to encompass the two-agent problem central to most of the literature, including variable...

This paper analyses a model of private unemployment insurance under limited commitment and a model of public unemployment insurance subject to moral hazard in an economy with a continuum of agents and an infinite time horizon. The dynamic and steady-state properties of the private unemployment...

This paper considers a long-term relationship between two agents who undertake costly actions or investments which produce a joint benefit. Agents have an opportunity to expropriate some of the joint benefit for their own use. The question asked is how to structure the investments and division...