If, as has been widely suggested, internal labor markets are declining and a new employment contract with reduced employer-employee commitment is emerging, the criteria by which employees judge layoffs as fair or unfair may be changing. This paper presents findings relevant to that question,...

This paper explores the effect of the possibility of third-party intervention on behavior in a variant of the Berg, Dickhaut, and McCabe (1995) “Investment Game”. A third-party’s material payoff is not affected by the decisions made by the other participants, but this person may choose to...

We examine, experimentally and theoretically, how communication within a partnership may mitigate the problem (highlighted in contract theory) of hidden action. What is the form and content of the communication? Which model of decision-making can capture the impact of communication? We consider...

We examine experimentally the impact of communication on trust and cooperation. Our design admits observation of promises, lies, and beliefs. The evidence is consistent with people striving to live up to others' expectations so as to avoid guilt, as can be modeled using psychological game...

Abstract: We consider bargaining in a bipartite network of buyers and sellers, who can only trade with the limited number of people with whom they are connected. Such networks could arise due to proximity issues or restricted communication flows, as with information transmission of job openings,...

We investigate the nature of continuous-time strategic interactions in public-goodsgames. In one set of treatments, four subjects make contribution decisions in continuous timewhile in another they make them only at discrete points of time. The effect of continuous timeis muted in public-goods...