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Evidence on the Incentive Properties of Share Contracts

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  • Luis H.B. Braido

    (Getulio Vargas Foundation, Graduate School of Economics)

Abstract

Ever since Adam Smith, share contracts have been condemned for their lack of incentives. Sharecropping tenants face incentives to undersupply productive inputs since they receive only a fraction of the marginal revenue. The empirical literature reports that lands under sharecropping are less productive and employ inputs less intensively than those operated by owners. This paper shows that: (i) share contracts are also associated with lower-quality lands; (ii) the sharecroppers' input choices satisfy profit-maximization conditions; and (iii) the contract form does not affect farm productivity conditional on land quality and input use. These findings suggest that farmers optimally choose to employ inputs less intensively in lower-quality lands under sharecropping and, then, these lands end up being less productive. Land- quality selection bias (as opposite to incentives) seems to be behind the existing evidence on the productive disadvantage of share contracts.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by EconWPA in its series Development and Comp Systems with number 0508013.

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Date of creation: 30 Aug 2005
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Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwpdc:0508013

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Keywords: Econometric test; moral hazard; development; tenancy data; selection bias;

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References

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  1. Douglas W. Allen & Dean Lueck, 1993. "Transaction Costs and the Design of Cropshare Contracts," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 24(1), pages 78-100, Spring.
  2. Radner, Roy, 1985. "Repeated Principal-Agent Games with Discounting," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 53(5), pages 1173-98, September.
  3. Radner, Roy, 1981. "Monitoring Cooperative Agreements in a Repeated Principal-Agent Relationship," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(5), pages 1127-48, September.
  4. Pierre Dubois, 1999. "Moral Hazard, Land Fertility and Sharecropping in a Rural Area of the Philippines," Working Papers 99-30, Centre de Recherche en Economie et Statistique.
  5. Laffont, Jean-Jacques & Matoussi, Mohamed Salah, 1995. "Moral Hazard, Financial Constraints and Sharecropping in El Oulja," Review of Economic Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 62(3), pages 381-99, July.
  6. Rao, C H Hanumantha, 1971. "Uncertainty, Entrepreneurship, and Sharecropping in India," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 79(3), pages 578-95, May-June.
  7. Jacoby, Hanan G. & Li, Guo & Rozelle, Scott, 2002. "Hazards Of Expropriation:Tenure Insecurity And Investment In Rural China," Working Papers 11960, University of California, Davis, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
  8. Shaban, Radwan Ali, 1987. "Testing between Competing Models of Sharecropping," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 95(5), pages 893-920, October.
  9. Jacoby, Hanan G. & Mansuri, Ghazala, 2006. "Incomplete contracts and investment : a study of land tenancy in Pakistan," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3826, The World Bank.
  10. Grossman, Sanford J & Hart, Oliver D, 1983. "An Analysis of the Principal-Agent Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 51(1), pages 7-45, January.
  11. Hodges, Dorothy J, 1969. "A Note on Estimation of Cobb-Douglas and CES Production Function Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 37(4), pages 721-25, October.
  12. D. Gale Johnson, 1950. "Resource Allocation under Share Contracts," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 58, pages 111.
  13. Bengt Holmstrom, 1979. "Moral Hazard and Observability," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(1), pages 74-91, Spring.
  14. Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1974. "Incentives and Risk Sharing in Sharecropping," Review of Economic Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(2), pages 219-55, April.
  15. Luis H. B. Braido, 2003. "Insurance and Incentives in Sharecropping," CESifo Working Paper Series 1098, CESifo Group Munich.
  16. Bandiera, Oriana, 2002. "Land Distribution, Incentives and the Choice of Production Techniques in Nicaragua," CEPR Discussion Papers 3141, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  17. Rubinstein, Ariel & Yaari, Menahem E., 1983. "Repeated insurance contracts and moral hazard," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 74-97, June.
  18. Mundlak, Yair, 1996. "Production Function Estimation: Reviving the Primal," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(2), pages 431-38, March.
  19. Allen, Douglas & Lueck, Dean, 1992. "Contract Choice in Modern Agriculture: Cash Rent versus Cropshare," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 35(2), pages 397-426, October.
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Citations

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Cited by:
  1. Luis H. B. Braido, 2003. "Insurance and Incentives in Sharecropping," CESifo Working Paper Series 1098, CESifo Group Munich.
  2. Franken, Jason R.V. & Pennings, Joost M.E. & Garcia, Philip, 2012. "Measuring Risk Attitude and Relation to Marketing Behavior," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 124471, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
  3. Luis H.B. Braido, 2005. "Risk and Insurance in Sharecropping," Risk and Insurance 0508002, EconWPA.
  4. Bellemare, Marc F., 2010. "Insecure Land Rights and Share Tenancy in Madagascar," MPRA Paper 23640, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  5. Pranab Bardhan & Dilip Mookherjee, 2007. "Land Reform And Farm Productivity In West Bengal," Boston University - Department of Economics - The Institute for Economic Development Working Papers Series dp-163, Boston University - Department of Economics.
  6. Ndoye Niane, Aifa Fatimata & Burger, Kees & Bulte, Erwin H., 2010. "Horticultural Households Profit Optimization and the Efficiency of Labour Contract Choice," 2010 AAAE Third Conference/AEASA 48th Conference, September 19-23, 2010, Cape Town, South Africa 95776, African Association of Agricultural Economists (AAAE) & Agricultural Economics Association of South Africa (AEASA).

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