This article provides an incentive-based explanation for the practice of job rotation. When agents privately learn about the productivity of tasks on which they work, job rotation can be an efficient means of eliciting their information. Each agent freely communicates his information since the...

This teaching note illustrates how reporting historical data, even when it is unverifiable, can be useful in improving productive efficiency. Historical cost accounting is evaluated in a simple multi-person setting with private information. Because the source of contracting frictions is limited...

This paper provides an explanation for why incentive contracts that are muted (compared to incentive contracts derived from standard agency models) may be effective in motivating team members. By having the team repeat a task in a second period, the explicit incentives that need to be provided...

We formally establish the link between linear algebra and the double entry bookkeeping system: the system transforms a vector of numerical values corresponding to transaction amounts to a financial statements vector through matrix multiplication. The matrix is called a generator matrix (it is...

A common explanation for why firms incur sunk costs is that technology considerations make them inescapable. This paper shows that sometimes firms may prefer to make early (less informed) investment decisions even when technology allows such decisions to be delayed. Sunk costs commit and clarify...

common explanation for why firms incur sunk costs is that technology considerations make them inescapable. This paper shows that sometimes firms may prefer to make early (less informed) investment decisions even when technology allows such decisions to be delayed. Sunk costs commit and clarify a...

Job rotation refers to the practice of routinely transferring employees between jobs. The explanations provided for job rotation are as varied as its uses.Some posit that complementarities and learning across tasks allow increased productive efficiency, while others speculate that employees'...

When the Revelation Principle (RP) holds, managing earnings confers no advantage over revelation. We construct an explanation for earnings management that is based on limitations on owners? ability to make commitments (a violation of the RP?s assumptions). Traditionally, earnings management is...

Though sunk costs impact future income calculations (via depreciation for example), accountants are reminded that their sunk nature makes them irrelevant for future decisions. An explanation for why firms routinely incur such costs is that technology considerations make them inescapable. This...

A prevailing view in the disclosure literature is that firms who learn favorable market information are reluctant to disclose it, fearing it will attract new rivals. In this paper, we demonstrate that the presence of dual distribution arrangements, wherein consumers can purchase products either...