IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jemstr/v3y1994i4p605-637.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Reputation, Product Quality, and Warranties

Author

Listed:
  • Nabil Ibraheem Al‐Najjar

Abstract

This paper studies the firm's choice between implicit and explicit contracts as alternative methods of assuring product quality. The relationship between these two contractual forms is studied using a dynamic model with imperfect monitoring and team moral hazard where both the firm and the consumer take unobservable actions that affect product performance. The firm chooses the contractual arrangement that maximizes expected profit. Identified are conditions on the primitive attributes of the transactions and on the firm's environment that can help explain why firms might decide to use explicit contracting, implicit contracting, or a combination of the two. I also show that there are conditions under which the introduction of reputation causes explicit contracts to be more uniform and less sensitive to the details of the transaction than implied by static models.

Suggested Citation

  • Nabil Ibraheem Al‐Najjar, 1994. "Reputation, Product Quality, and Warranties," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 3(4), pages 605-637, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:bla:jemstr:v:3:y:1994:i:4:p:605-637
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1430-9134.1995.00605.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1430-9134.1995.00605.x
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1430-9134.1995.00605.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Yoram Barzel, 1997. "Measurement Cost and the Organization of Markets," Chapters, in: Svetozar Pejovich (ed.), The Economic Foundations of Property Rights, chapter 13, pages 171-192, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Russell Cooper & Thomas W. Ross, 1985. "Product Warranties and Double Moral Hazard," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 16(1), pages 103-113, Spring.
    3. Drew Fudenberg & David K. Levine, 2008. "Maintaining a Reputation when Strategies are Imperfectly Observed," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Drew Fudenberg & David K Levine (ed.), A Long-Run Collaboration On Long-Run Games, chapter 8, pages 143-161, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    4. Emons, Winand, 1988. "Warranties, moral hazard, and the lemons problem," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 16-33, October.
    5. Klein, Benjamin & Leffler, Keith B, 1981. "The Role of Market Forces in Assuring Contractual Performance," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(4), pages 615-641, August.
    6. Bengt Holmstrom, 1982. "Moral Hazard in Teams," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 13(2), pages 324-340, Autumn.
    7. Klein, Benjamin & Crawford, Robert G & Alchian, Armen A, 1978. "Vertical Integration, Appropriable Rents, and the Competitive Contracting Process," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 21(2), pages 297-326, October.
    8. Nancy A. Lutz, 1989. "Warranties as Signals under Consumer Moral Hazard," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 20(2), pages 239-255, Summer.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Junhong Chu & Pradeep K. Chintagunta, 2009. "Quantifying the Economic Value of Warranties in the U.S. Server Market," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 28(1), pages 99-121, 01-02.
    2. Ibrahim Demir, 2016. "The firm size, farm size, and transaction costs: the case of hazelnut farms in Turkey," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 47(1), pages 81-90, January.
    3. Philip H. Dybvig & Nancy A. Lutz, 1993. "Warranties, Durability, and Maintenance: Two-sided Moral Hazard in a Continuous-Time Model," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 60(3), pages 575-597.
    4. Al-Najjar, Nabil I., 1997. "Incentive Contracts in Two-Sided Moral Hazards with Multiple Agents," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 74(1), pages 174-195, May.
    5. McClure, James & Kumcu, Erdogan, 2008. "Promotions and product pricing: Parsimony versus Veblenesque demand," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 105-117, January.
    6. Maloney, Michael T., 2017. "Alchian remembrances," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 561-582.
    7. Padmanabhan, V, 1995. "Usage Heterogeneity and Extended Warranties," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 4(1), pages 33-53, Spring.
    8. Francine Lafontaine & Margaret Slade, 2007. "Vertical Integration and Firm Boundaries: The Evidence," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 45(3), pages 629-685, September.
    9. Matthew Ellman, 2006. "Specificity Revisited: The Role of Cross-Investments," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 22(1), pages 234-257, April.
    10. Bigelow, Lyda S. & Argyres, Nicholas, 2008. "Transaction costs, industry experience and make-or-buy decisions in the population of early U.S. auto firms," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 66(3-4), pages 791-807, June.
    11. Daniel W. Elfenbein & Todd R. Zenger, 2014. "What Is a Relationship Worth? Repeated Exchange and the Development and Deployment of Relational Capital," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(1), pages 222-244, February.
    12. Belleflamme,Paul & Peitz,Martin, 2015. "Industrial Organization," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107687899.
    13. Giorgio Coricelli & Luigi Luini, 1999. "Double Moral Hazard: an Experiment on Warranties," CEEL Working Papers 9901, Cognitive and Experimental Economics Laboratory, Department of Economics, University of Trento, Italia.
    14. Tatyana Chesnokova, 2007. "Return policies, market outcomes, and consumer welfare," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 40(1), pages 296-316, February.
    15. D Vandegrift, 2001. "Quality‐Assuring Price And Breach Of Express Or Implied Warranty," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 19(2), pages 186-196, April.
    16. Todorova, Tamara, 2022. "Оливър Уилямсън: Новатор На 20 Век И Основател На Новата Институционална Икономика [Oliver Williamson: an innovator of the 20th century and founder of the new institutional economics]," MPRA Paper 121077, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Marlin U. Thomas & Sridevi S. Rao, 1999. "Warranty Economic Decision Models: A Summary and Some Suggested Directions for Future Research," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 47(6), pages 807-820, December.
    18. Liu, Shuo & Pei, Harry, 2020. "Monotone equilibria in signaling games," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    19. Ennio E. Piano & Louis Rouanet, 2020. "Economic calculation and the organization of markets," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 33(3), pages 331-348, September.
    20. Ola Kvaløy & Trond E. Olsen, 2006. "Team Incentives in Relational Employment Contracts," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 24(1), pages 139-170, January.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jemstr:v:3:y:1994:i:4:p:605-637. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/research/journals/JEMS/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.