Milton Friedman has famously claimed that the responsibility of a manager who is not the owner of a firm is "to conduct the business in accordance with their [the shareholders'] desires, which generally will be to make as much money as possible." In this paper we argue that when contracts are...

This paper studies lying in a simple framework. An agent first randomly picks a number from a known distribution. She can then claim to have observed any number from the set, receiving a monetary payoff based only on her report. Consistent with previous findings, our participants do not...

The Holt and Laury (2002) mechanism (HL) is the most widely-used method for eliciting risk preferences in economics. Participants typically make ten decisions with different variance options, with one of these choices randomly-chosen for actual payoff. For this mechanism to provide an accurate...

This paper studies lying. An agent randomly picks a number from a known distribution. She can then report any number and receive a monetary payoff based only on her report. The paper presents a model of lying costs that generates hypotheses regarding behavior. In an experiment, we find that the...

I compare lying behavior in a real-effort task in which participants have control over outcomes and a task in which outcomes are determined by pure luck. Participants lie significantly more in the random-draw task than in the real-effort task, leading to the conclusion lying about luck is...

Several studies in economics and finance show that parenthood can affect economic behavior. Here, we provide a large-sample (N = 2,008) experimental analysis of whether parents are less likely to cheat for monetary benefits than non-parents. We expect that parenting children could increase the...

Several studies in economics and finance show that parenthood can affect economic behavior. Here, we provide a large-sample (N = 2,008) experimental analysis of whether parents are less likely to cheat for monetary benefits than non-parents. We expect that parenting children could increase the...