Contracts with Wishful Thinkers

In a setting with a wishful thinking agent and a realistic principal, the paper studies how incentive contracts should be designed to control for both moral hazard and self‐deception. The properties of the contract that reconcile the agent with reality depend on the weight the agent attaches to anticipatory utility. When this is small, principal and agent agree on full recollection. For intermediate values the principal bears an extra cost to make the agent recall bad news. For large weights, the principal gives up on inducing signal recollection. We also extend the analysis to the case in which the parameter of anticipatory utility is private information.     

Limited Liability and Bonus Contracts

This paper studies the nature of incentive contracts between a risk-neutral principal and a risk-neutral agent under the constraint that the agent's liability is limited. A necessary and sufficient condition is derived for the existence of a first-best contract under this constraint, and a bonus-based contract is shown to be the most efficient contractual form. Implications of bonus contracts are also discussed.     

Information Acquisition and the Equilibrium Incentive Problem

I study the optimal incentive provision in a principal–agent relationship with costly information acquisition by the agent. I emphasize that adverse selection or moral hazard is the principal's endogenous choice by inducing or deterring information acquisition. The principal designs the contract not only to address an existing incentive problem but also to implement its presence. Implementation of adverse selection relies on a steeper information rent to the agent than the standard menu, such that the agent is motivated to distinguish the efficient state of nature from the inefficient. Moral hazard is implemented by replacing the benchmark debt contract with a debt‐with‐equity‐share contract, such that the agent does not attempt to acquire information to either avoid debt or to extract rent.     

Targets and Resources: A Screening Perspective

To secure funding for a project, an agent (informed about the project's type) announces a target output. The principal provides more generous resources for high targets but makes compensation tied to performance relative to the projection. The incentive mechanism is geared towards screening project/agent types for resource disbursement at the ex‐ante stage and motivating appropriate efforts at the interim stage. These dual objectives are embedded in an optimal share contract solution: a pair of startup funds and output share between the principal and agent. The target mechanism's performance is then assessed with respect to implementation of the optimal share contract solution. The focus is on linear contracts for their applicability and practical relevance. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Altruism and Relational Incentives in the Workplace

This paper studies how altruism between managers and employees affects relational incentive contracts. To this end, we develop a simple dynamic principal–agent model where both players may have feelings of altruism or spite toward each other. The contract may contain two types of incentives for the agent to work hard: a bonus and a threat of dismissal. We find that altruism undermines the credibility of a threat of dismissal but strengthens the credibility of a bonus. Among others, these two mechanisms imply that higher altruism sometimes leads to higher bonuses, whereas lower altruism may increase productivity and players' utility in equilibrium.     

Long-Term or Short-Term Managerial Incentive Contracts

This paper deals with the strategic role of the temporal dimension of contracts in a duopoly market. Is it better for a firm to sign long-term incentive contracts with managers or short-term contracts? For the linear case, with strategic substitutes (complements) in the product market, the incentive variables are also strategic substitutes (complements). It is shown that a long-term contract makes a firm a leader in incentives, while a short-term contract makes it a follower. We find that, under Bertrand competition, in equilibrium one firm signs a long-term contract and the other firm short-term incentive contracts; however, under Cournot competition, the dominant strategy is to sign long-term incentive contracts.     

Quality incentive contract design in government procurement of public services under dual asymmetric information

In the process of government procurement of public services (GPPS), adverse selection and moral hazard caused by dual asymmetric information can damage public interests and negatively affect the quality of public services. To improve the quality of GPPS, in this study, quality incentive contract models under the condition of dual asymmetric information are designed. These models are based on the optimal incentive contract model in principal–agent theory. The results show that under dual asymmetric information conditions, incentive contracts designed for a continuous type of service capability can identify and stimulate the service abilities of social organizations.     

Termination Clauses in Long-Term Contracts

Many long-term contracts incorporate a termination clause. This paper argues that when agents have hidden information, such a clause has a beneficial incentive effect—it enables a principal to screen agents' private information at a lower cost. In a two-period model, this paper characterizes the optimal long-term contract with a termination clause, which specifies that the principal will switch agents in the second period when the first-period cost is high. The analysis delineates how the optimality of this clause depends on the intertemporal cost correlation structure, on the limits to agents' liability, and on the principal's degree of commitment.     

Should managerial delegation contracts be made before or after union wage setting? A game‐theoretic analysis

This paper analyzes a multiple‐stage game in which, at the final stage, two (managerial) firms compete over quantities in the product market. Prior to this stage, firm‐specific unions set the workers' wages, while the owners of both firms hire managers and provide them with incentive contracts. Owners can freely decide to arrange the managerial contract before or after the (non‐managerial) wage determination stage. Hence, the endogenous choice of the incentive contract stage is derived. The possibility of multiple equilibria arises, where both owners choose managerial contracts before or after unions' wage setting, crucially depending on unions' preferences. Such results also prove to be true for a remarkable degree of asymmetry in preferences over wages vis‐à‐vis employment across unions.     

Managerial incentives and R&D investments: The moderating effect of the directors’ and officers’ liability insurance

Literature regarding the impact of managerial incentives on firm’s research and development (R&D) investments suggests that due to the riskiness of R&D activities, firms need to provide managerial incentives to encourage managerial discretion on corporate long-term investments of R&D. In spite that managerial incentives influence corporate R&D spending, some also argue corporate R&D spending a function of managerial incentive schemes. This paper applies the simultaneous equation to investigate the association between managerial discretion on R&D investments and the incentive scheme of CEO compensations by using the sample firms listed in Taiwan Security Exchange and Taipei Exchange. The results indicate that the listed firms in Taiwan simultaneously determine corporate R&D investments and CEO compensations. They reward their CEOs in compliance with their efforts on R&D investments and CEO compensation motivates CEOs to align their interests with firms’ long-term investments on R&D. A further analysis of the protection effect from the directors’ and officers’ (D&O) liability insurance suggests that D&O protection intensifies the relationship between R&D investments and CEO compensation. It encourages CEOs to allocate resources on R&D activities and make CEO incentive contracts efficacious on corporate long-term investments. The result is robust in the electronic industry of Taiwan.     

Do Managers with Limited Liability Take More Risky Decisions? An Information Acquisition Model

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 relatively more likely to arise from desirable than from undesirable actions. The resulting decisions may be less, rather than more, risky. Making a decision after acquiring information provides an additional reason to those in the classic principal‐agent literature for using contracts with pay increasing in the return. Further results on the form of contracts are also derived.     

Incorporating a “no claim bonus” in insurance agency contract

A bonus received by an agent from an insurer when the insured does not make a claim is called a “no claim bonus” (NCB). An NCB rewards the agent's risk‐management (RM) effort that reduces the probability that the insured suffers a loss. This paper designs an incentive compatible contract that induces the agent to choose an RM effort. If the agent's RM effort cost is lower than a threshold, feasible ranges of NCB and premium values exist such that the insurer can offer an incentive compatible agency contract with an NCB that is acceptable to the agent.     

Subjective performance of patent examiners,implicit contracts,and self‐funded patent offices

Self‐funded patent offices should be concerned with patent quality (patents should be granted to only deserving innovations) and quantity (as revenues come from fees paid by applicants). In this context, we investigate what is the impact of the self‐funded constraint on different bonus contracts and how these contracts affect the examiners' incentive to prosecute patent applications. We consider contracts in which a patent office offers bonuses on quantity quotas (explicit contract) and on quality outcome (either an implicit contract or an explicit contract based on a quality proxy). We find that a self‐funded constrained agency should make different organization choices of incentives. For a low quality proxy precision, an agency facing a tight budget operates well with implicit contracts. However, by only relaxing moderately the budget constraint, the agency might be worse off simply because this will preclude implicit contracts. Only very large patenting fees might allow the agency to compensate for the loss of implicit contracts.     

Dual roles in psychological contracts: When managers take both agent and principal roles

Departing from the long-espoused assumption that managers act only as agents in employees' psychological contract with the organization, this paper asserts that in addition to the agent role, some managers, in an attempt to further their own self-interests, form and enact their own psychological contracts as principals with select employees. The combination of these dual roles often yields unacknowledged but significantly negative consequences for the employing organizations, the managers who choose a principal role, and the select employees with whom they form a psychological contract. Drawing upon agency, psychological contract, and social exchange theories, we develop the distinctive characteristics of the agent vs. principal roles, identify the antecedents that motivate managers to assume a principal role, develop four archetypes for combining the dual roles, and suggest the potentially harmful consequences for the above three parties mentioned. The paper concludes with theoretical and practical implications and suggestions for future research.     

Technology transfer, licensing and the speed of endogenous technological change

As licensing contracts usually require the licensee firm to purchase tied inputs from the seller of the technology, the licensee firm has an incentive to embark on an R&D program for development of substitutes for the tied inputs. This paper characterizes the licensee firm's optimal speed of R&D and the optimal expected date of switch-over to the substitute inputs in an infinite-horizon model under uncertainty about the timing of success of the R&D program. The effects of different government subsidies or taxes, changes in input prices and other parameters on the optimal speed of R&D and on the expected date of switchover to the substitute are also investigated. It is also shown that strategic behavior by the seller of the technology may delay the development of the substitute by the licensee firm.     

具有奖励机制与再保险安排的最优保险合约设计

在保险合约中引入奖励机制可以使投保人动态参与到保险合约中,赋予了投保人在面对索赔事件时是否执行索赔的可选择权,改变了传统保险合约中投保人执行索赔的单一权利,但却增加了保险人潜在的流动性风险。保险合约中再保险的安排则可以对冲由于奖励机制产生的潜在流动性风险,进一步分散保险人的风险,有助于保险人稳健经营。基于此,通过建立具有红利奖励机制与再保险安排的最优保险合约设计模型,最终求解得到最优保险合约是具有最优免赔额形式的保险合约。利用算例研究方法进行建模,研究结果显示,最优保险合约中的最优免赔额与奖励机制中的红利奖励之间具有正向关系,保费、自留额与最优免赔额之间则存在着显著的负向关系。     

高管激励、R&D投入与高新技术企业绩效——基于内生视角下的研究

基于内生视角,选取2009—2017年A股中小板块的高新技术企业数据为研究样本,以附加价值的资本增值率来衡量企业绩效状况,构建联立方程组模型,实证分析研发投入、管理者薪酬激励和股权激励对高新技术企业绩效的影响。研究结果表明：薪资激励对R&D投入和企业绩效均存在倒U型关系,股权激励与企业绩效正相关,与R&D投入存在倒U型关系,R&D投入对当期企业绩效存在负向影响,但其对企业绩效的滞后效应为正。进一步研究发现,上述结论在民营企业中普遍存在,而在国有企业中并不明显。     

IT Contract Flexibility and Negotiator Incentives

Information Technology outsourcing contracts are plagued by inflexibility. We develop an economic model to explain how the contract negotiator's incentives influence contract flexibility. We show that neither wage nor one‐time commission type pay gives any preference for flexibility. However, a promotion incentive, where the bonus is an ongoing bonus, does give the negotiator a preference for less flexible contracts. The preference for less flexible contracts increases as the discount rate increases. The preference for less flexible contracts increases as the number of competitors for the promotion increases. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Signaling by an informed service provider

We study a service provider, who, at the time of offering a contract, is better informed than the potential client. A service provider that is hired to increase the client's chance of a gain, an “enhancer,” may be better informed of whether the client has a big or small opportunity. A service provider that is hired to reduce the client's chance of a loss, a “problem solver,” may be better informed of whether the client has a big or small problem. We show that an enhancer predominantly offers a contingent contract, while a problem solver predominantly offers a flat fee due to their signaling incentives. This explains the differences in real‐world contracts and also provides a novel explanation for the existence of low‐powered incentive contracts. We evaluate the policy intervention that limits the contingent part of the service providers' contracts.     

Dynamic incentive contracts with termination threats

We consider a dynamic moral hazard model where the principal offers a series of short-run contracts. We study the optimal mix of two alternative instruments for incentive provision: a performance based wage (a “carrot”) and a termination threat (a “stick”). At any given point in time, these instruments are substitutes in the provision of incentives. We are particularly interested in the dynamic interaction of these two instruments. Both carrot and stick are used more intensively as the agent approaches the end of his finite life. The sharing of the surplus of the relationship plays a key role: a termination threat is included in the optimal contract if and only if the agent’s expected future gain from the relationship is sufficiently high, compared to the principal’s expected future gain. Also, a termination threat is more likely to be optimal if output depends more on “luck” than on effort, if the discount factor is high, or if the agent’s productivity is low. The model, provided that the optimal contract includes a termination threat, essentially provides an alternative explanation for upward-sloping wage profiles even in the absence of full-commitment.