In repeated principal-agent models, long-term contracts can improve on short-term contracts only if they commit ei ther the principal or agent to a payoff in some future circumstances lower than could be obtained from a short-term contract negotiated if that circumstance occurs. The authors show...

Institutional and Financial Incentives for Social Insurance provides both an empirical and a theoretical account of the main difficulties presently threatening social insurance systems in most industrialized countries. It analyzes the remedies that have been discussed and sometimes introduced...