Recent research has led to the empirical regularity that rm growth rate distributionsare heavy tailed. This nding implies that a few rms experience spectaculargrowth rates and decline, but that most rms have marginal growth rates. The literatureon high growth rms shows that high growth rms are...

To reduce the competition from farmers who self-produce seed, an inbred line seed producercan switch to nondurable hybrid seed. In a two-period model we investigate the impactof crop durability on self-production, pricing and switching decisions, and we examine theimpact of license fees paid by...

A popular view of limited liability in financial contracting is that it is the result of societal preferences against escessive penalties. The view of most financial economists is instead that limited liability emerged as an optimal institution when, in the absence of a clear limit on economic...

This paper studies the impact of cash constraints on equilibrium research intensities in a patent race between a current owner of the “state of the art” technology (the incumbent) and entrants. We develop a simple model, where players need to raise funds from imperfectly informed creditors to...

We analyze optimal contract choice in agriculture when there is joint moral hazard onthe part of the farmer in the supply of effort and the riskiness of the technique ofcultivation. In the presence of limited liability, high-powered incentive contracts such asfixed rental contracts will induce...

This paper analyzes dynamic equilibrium risk sharing contracts between profit-maximizing intermediaries and a large pool of ex-ante identical agents that face idiosyncratic income uncertainty that makes them heterogeneous ex-post. In any given period, after having observed her income, the agent...

This paper shows how this becomes an informational first-mover advantage that turns innovators into the market leader.

This paper shows how a financial institution can profit from the development of financial products even if they are unpatentable.