Firms in socialist and transitional economies are often obliged to provide a social good in addition to a private good, which makes it difficult for a government to commit not to bail out the firm once it is in financial trouble. This creates a soft budget constraint syndrome which causes the...

The paper examines the determinants of the division of labor within firms. It provides an explanation of the pervasive observed changes in work organization away from the traditional functional departments and towards multi-tasking and job rotation. Whereas the existing literature on the...