Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Contracts and Externalities: How Things Fall Apart

Contents:

Author Info

  • Garance Genicot
  • Debraj Ray

Abstract

A single principal interacts with several agents, offering them contracts. The crucial assumption of this paper is that the outside-option payoffs of the agents depend positively on how many free agents there are (these are agents who are not under contract). We study how such a principal, unwelcome though he may be, approaches the problem of contract provision to agents when coordination failure among the latter group is explicitly ruled out. Two variants are studied. When the principal cannot re-approach agents, there is a unique equilibrium, in which contract provision is split up into two phases. In phase 1, simultaneous offers at good (though varying)terms are made to a number of agents. In phase 2, offers must be made sequentially, and their values are discontinuously lower: they are close to the very lowest of all the outside options. When the principal can repeatedly approach the same agent, there is a multiplicity of equilibria. In some of these, the agents have the power to force delay. They can hold off the principals overtures temporarily, but they must succumb in finite time. Furthermore, even though the maximal delay does go to infinity as the discount factor approaches one, the (discount-normalized) payoff of the agents must stay below and bounded away from the fully free reservation payoff. It is in this sense that things [eventually] fall apart as far as the agents are concerned.

(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.dklevine.com/archive/refs4506439000000000235.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by David K. Levine in its series Levine's Working Paper Archive with number 506439000000000235.

as in new window
Length:
Date of creation: 06 Feb 2003
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:cla:levarc:506439000000000235

Contact details of provider:
Web page: http://www.dklevine.com/

Related research

Keywords:

Other versions of this item:

References

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
as in new window
  1. Armo Gomes & Philippe Jehiel, 2001. "Dynamic Processes of Social and Economic Interactions: On the Persistence of Inefficiencies," Penn CARESS Working Papers 76ff153ae29996d16c454e473, Penn Economics Department.
  2. Jehiel, Philippe & Moldovanu, Benny, 1995. "Negative Externalities May Cause Delay in Negotiation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 63(6), pages 1321-35, November.
  3. Ray, D. & Vohra, R., 1996. "A Theory of Endogenous Coalition Structure," Papers 68, Boston University - Industry Studies Programme.
  4. Genicot, Garance, 2002. "Bonded labor and serfdom: a paradox of voluntary choice," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 101-127, February.
  5. Rasmusen, Eric B & Ramseyer, J Mark & Wiley, John S, Jr, 1991. "Naked Exclusion," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1137-45, December.
  6. Jehiel, Philippe & Moldovanu, Benny, 1995. "Cyclical Delay in Bargaining with Externalities," Review of Economic Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 62(4), pages 619-37, October.
  7. McAfee, R Preston & Schwartz, Marius, 1994. "Opportunism in Multilateral Vertical Contracting: Nondiscrimination, Exclusivity, and Uniformity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(1), pages 210-30, March.
  8. Innes, Robert & Sexton, Richard J, 1994. "Strategic Buyers and Exclusionary Contracts," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(3), pages 566-84, June.
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 in new window

Cited by:
  1. Pierre Dupraz & Karine Latouche & Nadine Turpin, 2007. "Programmes agri-environnementaux en présence d’effets de seuil," Cahiers d'Economie et Sociologie Rurales, INRA Department of Economics, vol. 82, pages 5-32.
  2. Csorba, Gergely, 2008. "Contracting with asymmetric information in the presence of positive network effects: Screening and divide-and-conquer techniques," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 54-66, March.
  3. BELLEFLAMME, Paul & TOULEMONDE, Eric, 2007. "Negative intra-group externalities in two-sided markets," CORE Discussion Papers 2007039, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
  4. Francis Bloch & Armando Gomes, 2004. "Contracting with Externalities and Outside Options," Working Papers 2004.78, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
  5. Mike Felgenhauer & Hans Grüner, 2007. "Distortionary lobbying," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 8(3), pages 181-195, May.
  6. Galasso, Alberto, 2008. "Coordination and bargaining power in contracting with externalities," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 143(1), pages 558-570, November.
  7. Currarini, Sergio & Feri, Francesco, 2006. "Delegation versus centralization: The role of externalities," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 112-119, June.
  8. repec:old:wpaper:336-11 is not listed on IDEAS
  9. Galasso, Alberto, 2010. "Over-confidence may reduce negotiation delay," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 716-733, December.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cla:levarc:506439000000000235

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (David K. Levine).

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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