We analyze competition through incentive contracts for managers in duopoly. Privately informed managers exert surplus enhancing effort that generates an externality on the rival. Asymmetric information on imperfectly correlated shocks creates a two-way distortion of efforts under strategic...

This paper applies incentive theory to the context of the European Union (EU) Regional Policy. The core instruments of the policy are the Structural Funds, capital grants that flow from the European Commission (EC) to Member States and regional authorities to promote investment and growth at...

In this paper we study whether and how the belief that the gender of politicians affects their competence on different issues influences electoral outcomes depending on the salience of those issues. We first propose a theoretical model of issue-specific gender bias in elections which can...

We analyze the choice of incentive contracts by oligopolistic firms that compete on the product market. Managers have private information and in the first stage they exert cost reducing effort. In equilibrium the standard "no distortion at the top" property disappears and two way distortions are...

Constitutional structures shape politicians' behaviour and hence policy outcomes through the di fferent incentive schemes at work. In this paper we analyse these mechanisms in parliamentary and presidential systems. Such a comparison is carried over by analysing how the two systems are able to...

This paper raises a neglecteed point in the literature on local public services, showing that even "formal privatizaion" (the transformation of the service provider into a joint-stock company) has a significant influence on the agents involved. The relationship between local government and the...