We study optimal incentive contracts for workers who are reciprocal to management attention. When neither worker's effort nor manager's attention can be contracted, a double moral-hazard problem arises, implying that reciprocal workers should be given weak financial incentives. In a...

This paper argues that accrual-based financial accounting, including the conservative recognition of anticipated cash flows, mimics the properties of an optimal multi-period incentive contract between a firm and a manager. I study a two-period principal-agent model in which a manager can be...

We analyze the effects of lower bounds on wages, e.g., minimum wages or liability limits, on job design within firms. In our model, two tasks contribute to non-veriable firm value and affect an imperfect performance measure. The tasks can be assigned to either one or two agents. In the absence...

Consider managers evaluating their employees’ performances. Should managers justify their subjective evaluations? Suppose a manager’s evaluation is private information. Justifying her evaluation is costly but limits the principal’s scope for distorting her evaluation of the employee. I...

Risk-neutral individuals take more risky decisions when they have limited liability. Risk-neutral managers may not when acting as agents under contract and taking costly actions to acquire information before taking decisions. Limited liability makes it optimal to increase the reward for outcomes...

In recognition of the importance and expansion of the gig economy, largely in developed and BRICs economies, along with the growing literature surrounding it, this research contributes towards an empirical and conceptual understanding of how employee motivation and retention are managed by the...

I examine whether stochastic contracts benefit the principal in the setting of moral hazard and loss aversion. Incorporating that the agent is expectation-based loss averse and allowing the principal to add noise to performance signals, I find that stochastic contracts reduce the principal's...

Empfehlungen zur Beschränkung von Abfindungen an vorzeitig ausscheidende Vorstandsmitglieder werden häufig nicht eingehalten. Solange Vorstandsmitglieder nicht gegen ihren Willen entlassen werden dürfen, ist eine Beschränkung der Abfindungen weder im Interesse der Unternehmen noch effizient....

This article characterizes the properties of the compensation scheme of delegated portfolio management that would lead to the selection of high risk-high return portfolios. In particular, it provides conditions under which a non-monotone payment structure emerges as an optimal contract, which...

We characterize optimal incentive contracts in a moral hazard framework extended in two directions. First, after effort provision, the agent is free to leave and pursue some ex-post outside option. Second, the value of this outside option is increasing in effort, and hence endogenous. Optimal...