This paper investigates the optimal design of incentives when agents distort probabilities. We show that the type of probability distortion displayed by the agent and its degree determine whether an incentivecompatible contract can be implemented, the strength of the incentives included in the...

This study analyzed the principal-agent problem, in which the agent performs risk management tasks, and considered the cost minimization problem of the principal, the objective of which is to design the cheapest contract inducing a target effort. Our results confirm that a one-step bonus...

Consider an agent who can costlessly add mean-preserving noise to his output. To deter such risk-taking, the principal optimally offers a contract that makes the agent's utility concave in output. If the agent is risk-neutral and protected by limited liability, this concavity constraint binds...

In a repeated unobserved endowment economy in which agents negotiate long-term contracts with a financial intermediary, we study the implications of the interaction between incentive compatibility and participation constraints for risk sharing. In particular, we assume that after a default...

A buyer makes an offer to a privately informed seller for a good of uncertain quality. Quality determines both the seller's valuation and the buyer's valuation, and the buyer evaluates each contract according to its worst-case performance over a set of probability distributions. This paper...

I consider a neoclassical growth model with endogenous labor supply in which agents have private information about their idiosyncratic value of leisure. A key assumption is that these shocks follow a persistent stochastic process over time. For this economy I solve the economy-wide mechanism...

This paper seeks to characterize incentive compensation in a static principal-agent moral hazard setting in which both the principal and the agent are prudent (or downside risk averse). We show that optimal incentive pay should then be `approximately concave' in performance, the approximation...

We analyze a long-term contracting problem involving common uncertainty about a parameter capturing the productivity of the relationship, and featuring a hidden action for the agent. We develop an approach that works for any utility function when the parameter and noise are normally distributed...

I develop a dynamic agency model of financial contracting, where borrowing constraints appear as part of the optimal contract. The novelty of the paper relative to previous work is that volatility is stochastic and exogenous to the agent behavior. A line of credit appears in the optimal long...