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Unemployment with Observable Aggregate Shocks

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  • Grossman, Sanford J.
  • Hart, Oliver D.
  • Maskin, Eric S.
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    Abstract

    A general equilibrium model of' optimal employment contracts is developed where firms have better information about labor's marginal product than workers. It is optimal for the wage to be tied to the level of employment, to prevent the firm from falsely stating that the marginal product is low and cutting the wage. It is shown that an observed aggregate shock that leads to an interindustry shift in labor demand and that would have no effect on total employment under symmetric information leads to a reduction in employment when firms and workers have asymmetric information.

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    File URL: http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/3448840/Hart_UnemploymentObservableAgg.pdf
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    Bibliographic Info

    Paper provided by Harvard University Department of Economics in its series Scholarly Articles with number 3448840.

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    Date of creation: 1983
    Date of revision:
    Publication status: Published in Journal of Political Economy -Chicago-
    Handle: RePEc:hrv:faseco:3448840

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    References

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    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.:
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    1. Taylor, John B, 1980. "Aggregate Dynamics and Staggered Contracts," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 88(1), pages 1-23, February.
    2. Stanley Fischer & Franco Modigliani, 1978. "Towards an understanding of the real effects and costs of inflation," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer, vol. 114(4), pages 810-833, December.
    3. Grossman, Sanford J & Weiss, Laurence, 1982. "Heterogeneous Information and the Theory of the Business Cycle," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(4), pages 699-727, August.
    4. Fischer, Stanley, 1982. "Relative price variability and inflation in the United States and Germany," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 171-196.
    5. Holmstrom, Bengt R & Weiss, Laurence, 1985. "Managerial Incentives, Investment, and Aggregate Implications: Scale Effects," Review of Economic Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(3), pages 403-25, July.
    6. Harris Milton & Townsend, Robert M, 1981. "Resource Allocation under Asymmetric Information," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(1), pages 33-64, January.
    7. Dasgupta, Partha S & Hammond, Peter J & Maskin, Eric S, 1979. "The Implementation of Social Choice Rules: Some General Results on Incentive Compatibility," Review of Economic Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(2), pages 185-216, April.
    8. Fischer, Stanley, 1982. "Relative price variability and inflation in the United States and Germany," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 171-196.
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    Cited by:
    1. Haubrich, Joseph G & King, Robert G, 1991. "Sticky Prices, Money, and Business Fluctuations," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 23(2), pages 243-59, May.
    2. Julio J. Rotemberg & Garth Saloner, 1984. "A Supergame-Theoretic Model of Business Cycles and Price Wars During Booms," Working papers 349, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Department of Economics.
    3. William P. Osterberg, 1992. "Intervention and the bid-ask spread in G-3 foreign exchange rates," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, issue Q II, pages 2-13.
    4. Joseph G. Haubrich, 1992. "Sluggish deposit rates: endogenous institutions and aggregate fluctuations," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, issue Q II, pages 23-35.
    5. Bruce C. Greenwald & Joseph E. Stiglitz, 1988. "Imperfect Information, Credit Markets and Unemployment," NBER Working Papers 2093, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Pablo Ruiz Verdú, 2002. "Employer Behavior When Workers Can Unionize," Business Economics Working Papers wb020803, Universidad Carlos III, Departamento de Economía de la Empresa.
    7. Duranton, Gilles & Haniotis, Toni, 2004. "A comparison between economic systems with an application to transition," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(9-10), pages 2125-2157, August.
    8. Kahn, Charles M. & Mookherjee, Dilip, 1995. "Market failure with moral hazard and side trading," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 159-184, October.
    9. Matthew B. Canzoneri & Anne C. Sibert, 1984. "The macroeconomic implications of labor contracting with asymmetric information," International Finance Discussion Papers 248, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).

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