IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bge/wpaper/1085.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Monotone Contracts

Author

Listed:
  • Daniel Bird
  • Alexander Frug

Abstract

We develop a framework for deriving dynamic monotonicity results in long-term stochastic contracting problems with symmetric information. Specifically, we construct a notion of concave separable activity that encompasses many prevalent contractual components (e.g., wage, effort, level of production, etc.). We then provide a tight condition under which such activities manifest a form of seniority in every contracting problem in which they are present: any change that occurs in the level of the activity over time favors the agent. Our work unifies and significantly generalizes many existing results and can also be used to establish monotonicity results in other settings of interest.

Suggested Citation

  • Daniel Bird & Alexander Frug, 2019. "Monotone Contracts," Working Papers 1085, Barcelona School of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:bge:wpaper:1085
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.barcelonagse.eu/sites/default/files/working_paper_pdfs/1085_0.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Grochulski, Borys & Zhang, Yuzhe, 2011. "Optimal risk sharing and borrowing constraints in a continuous-time model with limited commitment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 146(6), pages 2356-2388.
    2. Fabien Postel-Vinay & Jean-Marc Robin, 2002. "The Distribution of Earnings in an Equilibrium Search Model with State-Dependent Offers and Counteroffers," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 43(4), pages 989-1016, November.
    3. Fabien Postel-Vinay & Jean-Marc Robin, 2002. "Equilibrium Wage Dispersion with Worker and Employer Heterogeneity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(6), pages 2295-2350, November.
    4. Patrick Bolton & Mathias Dewatripont, 2005. "Contract Theory," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262025760, April.
    5. Shouyong Shi, 2009. "Directed Search for Equilibrium Wage-Tenure Contracts," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(2), pages 561-584, March.
    6. Lazear, Edward P, 1981. "Agency, Earnings Profiles, Productivity, and Hours Restrictions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(4), pages 606-620, September.
    7. Dirk Bergemann & Juuso V‰lim‰ki, 2010. "The Dynamic Pivot Mechanism," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 78(2), pages 771-789, March.
    8. Ken Burdett & Melvyn Coles, 2003. "Equilibrium Wage-Tenure Contracts," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(5), pages 1377-1404, September.
    9. Wouter Dessein, 2002. "Authority and Communication in Organizations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 69(4), pages 811-838.
    10. Lorne Carmichael, 1983. "Firm-Specific Human Capital and Promotion Ladders," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 14(1), pages 251-258, Spring.
    11. Alex Gershkov & Benny Moldovanu, 2009. "Dynamic Revenue Maximization with Heterogeneous Objects: A Mechanism Design Approach," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 1(2), pages 168-198, August.
    12. Daniel Bird & Alexander Frug, 2019. "Dynamic Non-monetary Incentives," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 11(4), pages 111-150, November.
    13. Katharine G. Abraham & Henry S. Farber, 1988. "Returns to Seniority in Union and Nonunion Jobs: A New Look at the Evidence," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 42(1), pages 3-19, October.
    14. Topel, Robert H, 1991. "Specific Capital, Mobility, and Wages: Wages Rise with Job Seniority," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(1), pages 145-176, February.
    15. Parsons, Donald O, 1972. "Specific Human Capital: An Application to Quit Rates and Layoff Rates," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 80(6), pages 1120-1143, Nov.-Dec..
    16. Said, Maher, 2012. "Auctions with dynamic populations: Efficiency and revenue maximization," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 147(6), pages 2419-2438.
    17. Prendergast, Canice & Topel, Robert H, 1996. "Favoritism in Organizations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 104(5), pages 958-978, October.
    18. Milton Harris & Bengt Holmstrom, 1982. "A Theory of Wage Dynamics," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 49(3), pages 315-333.
    19. Jin Li & Niko Matouschek & Michael Powell, 2017. "Power Dynamics in Organizations," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(1), pages 217-241, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Forand, Jean Guillaume & Zapal, Jan, 2020. "Production priorities in dynamic relationships," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 15(3), July.

    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. Daniel Bird & Alexander Frug, 2021. "Optimal Contracts with Randomly Arriving Tasks," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(637), pages 1905-1918.
    2. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2373-2437 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2291-2372 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Devereux, Paul J. & Hart, Robert A. & Roberts, J. Elizabeth, 2013. "Job Spells, Employer Spells, and Wage Returns to Tenure," IZA Discussion Papers 7384, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Burdett, Ken & Coles, Melvyn, 2010. "Wage/tenure contracts with heterogeneous firms," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 145(4), pages 1408-1435, July.
    6. Andreas Hornstein & Per Krusell & Giovanni L. Violante, 2011. "Frictional Wage Dispersion in Search Models: A Quantitative Assessment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(7), pages 2873-2898, December.
    7. Paul Hek & Daniel Vuuren, 2011. "Are older workers overpaid? A literature review," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 18(4), pages 436-460, August.
    8. Buchinsky, Mosche & Kramarz, Francis & Fougère, Denis & Kamionka, Thierry & Beffy, Magali, 2006. "The Returns to Seniority in France (and Why are They Lower than in the United States?)," CEPR Discussion Papers 5486, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    9. Kenneth Burdett & Carlos Carrillo‐Tudela & Melvyn G. Coles, 2011. "Human Capital Accumulation And Labor Market Equilibrium," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 52(3), pages 657-677, August.
    10. Canice Prendergast, 1996. "What Happens Within Firms? A Survey of Empirical Evidence on Compensation Policies," NBER Working Papers 5802, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Ronald Wolthoff, 2014. "It'S About Time: Implications Of The Period Length In An Equilibrium Search Model," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 55(3), pages 839-867, August.
    12. Lalith Munasinghe & Brendan O'Flaherty, 2005. "Specific Training Sometimes Cuts Wages and Always Cuts Turnover," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 23(2), pages 213-234, April.
    13. Lipnowski, Elliot & Ramos, João, 2020. "Repeated delegation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 188(C).
    14. Balke, Neele & Lamadon, Thibaut, 2021. "Productivity shocks, long-term contracts and earnings dynamics," Working Paper Series 2021:19, IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy.
    15. Jeremy T. Fox, 2010. "Estimating the Employer Switching Costs and Wage Responses of Forward-Looking Engineers," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 28(2), pages 357-412, April.
    16. Nobuhiro Kiyotaki & Ricardo Lagos, 2007. "A Model of Job and Worker Flows," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 115(5), pages 770-819, October.
    17. Carrillo-Tudela, Carlos & Coles, Melvyn, 2015. "Quit Turnover and the Business Cycle: A Survey," IZA Discussion Papers 9366, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Alberto Bayo-Moriones & Jose E. Galdon-Sanchez & Maia Güell, 2010. "Is seniority-based pay used as a motivational device? Evidence from plant-level data," Research in Labor Economics, in: Jobs, Training, and Worker Well-being, pages 155-187, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    19. Christopher Taber & Rune Vejlin, 2020. "Estimation of a Roy/Search/Compensating Differential Model of the Labor Market," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 88(3), pages 1031-1069, May.
    20. Parent, Daniel, 1996. "Survol des contributions théoriques et empiriques liées au capital humain," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 72(3), pages 315-356, septembre.
    21. Björklund, Anders & Åkerman, Jeanette, 1989. "Piece-Rates, On-the-Job Training and the Wage-Tenure Profile," Working Paper Series 246, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    22. Giovanni Sulis, 2014. "Wage Returns to Experience and Tenure for Young Men in Italy," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 61(5), pages 559-588, November.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    dynamic contracting; activities; seniority;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D86 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Economics of Contract Law

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:bge:wpaper:1085. 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: Bruno Guallar (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bargses.html .

    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.