This paper examines the effect of imperfect labor market competition on the efficiency of compensation schemes in a setting with moral hazard and risk-averse agents, who have private information on their productivity. Two vertically differentiated firms compete for agents by offering contracts...

Empirical and experimental papers nd that high-powered incentives may re-duce performance rather than improve it; a phenomenon referred to as "chokingunder pressure". We show that competition for high ability workers neverthelessleads rms to oer high bonus payments, thereby deliberately...

Recent theoretical research has identified many ways how contracts can be used as rent seeking devices vis-à-vis third parties, but there is no empirical evidence on this issue so far. To test some basic qualitative properties of this literature, we develop a theoretical and empirical framework...