This work studies the organization of less-than-truckload trucking from a contractual point of view. We show that the huge number of owner-operators working in the industry hides a much less fragmented reality. Most of those owner-operators are 'quasi-integrated' in higher organizational...

The paper explores an efficiency hypothesis regarding the contractual process between large retailers, such as Wal-Mart and Carrefour, and their suppliers. The empirical evidence presented supports the idea that large retailers play a quasi-judicial role, acting as "courts of first instance" in...

The paper explores the consequences that different behavioral assumptions in the training of managers may have on their future performance. We argue that training with an emphasis on the standard assumptions used in economics (rationality and self-interest) is good for technical posts but may...

We study the effect of organizational choice and institutions on the performance of Spanish car dealerships. Using outlet-level data from 1994, we find that vertically-integrated dealerships showed substantially lower labor productivity, higher labor costs and lower profitability than franchised...

Impersonal exchange increases trade and specialization opportunities, encouraging economic growth. However it requires the support of sophisticated public institutions. This paper explains how Classical Rome provided such support in the main areas of economic activity by relying on public...

Human beings increase their productivity by specializing their resources and exchanging their products. The organization of exchange is costly, however, because specialized activities need coordination and incentives have to be aligned. This work first describes how these exchanges are organized...

This article examines the private mechanisms used to safeguard quality in auditing, with a view to defining rules capable of facilitating the performance of market forces. An outline is given of a general theory of private quality assurance in auditing, based on the use of quasi-rents to...

This paper applies ideas and findings from Managerial Accounting to the problem of public good provision. It first links the problems of traditional bureaucracies with those of “discretionary expense centers”, which are characterized by poor user and supplier incentives as well as...

This paper examines factors explaining subcontracting decisions in the construction industry. Rather than the more common cross-sectional analyses, we use panel data to evaluate the influence of all relevant variables. We design and use a new index of the closeness to small numbers situations to...

Over recent years, both governments and international aid organizations have been devoting large amounts of resources to 'simplifying' the procedures for setting up and formalizing firms. Many of these actions have focused on reducing the initial costs of setting up the firm, disregarding the...