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Professionalism and Contracts in Organizations

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  • Canice Prendergast

Abstract

Employees in public agencies rarely have pay for performance: instead their incentives are often guided by a sense of professionalism. This paper concerns how organizations should monitor professionals. The primary outcome of the paper is that weak incentives lead public agencies to exhibit bias in their oversight, by rewarding the interests of their employees to the detriment of other constituencies' concerns. In some instances, this bias is complete by entirely ignoring other interests.

Suggested Citation

  • Canice Prendergast, 2015. "Professionalism and Contracts in Organizations," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 33(3), pages 591-621.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jlabec:doi:10.1086/679671
    DOI: 10.1086/679671
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Itoh, Hideshi, 1992. "Cooperation in Hierarchical Organizations: An Incentive Perspective," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 8(2), pages 321-345, April.
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    Cited by:

    1. Hanson, Torbjørn & Lindgren, Petter Y., 2019. "No country for old men? Increasing the retirement age in the Armed Forces," MPRA Paper 95917, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Mishra, Ajit & Sarangi, Sudipta, 2016. "High-powered incentives and communication failure," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PA), pages 51-60.
    3. Timothy Perri, 2018. "Economics of evaluation (with special reference to promotion and tenure committees)," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 1-19, February.

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