IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jgames/v4y2013i4p670-689d30528.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Optimality of Team Contracts

Author

Listed:
  • Mehmet Barlo

    (FASS, Sabancı University, Tuzla, Istanbul 34956, Turkey)

  • Ayça Özdoğan

    (Department of Economics, TOBB University of Economics and Technology, Sögütözü Cad. No. 43, Sögütözü, Ankara 06560, Turkey)

Abstract

This paper analyzes optimal contracts in a linear hidden-action model with normally distributed returns possessing two moments that are governed jointly by two agents who have negative exponential utilities. They can observe and verify each others’ effort levels and draft enforceable side-contracts on effort levels and realized returns. Standard constraints, resulting in incentive contracts, fail to ensure implementability, and we examine centralized collusion-proof contracts and decentralized team contracts, as well. We prove that the principal may restrict attention to team contracts whenever returns from the project satisfy a mild monotonicity condition.

Suggested Citation

  • Mehmet Barlo & Ayça Özdoğan, 2013. "The Optimality of Team Contracts," Games, MDPI, vol. 4(4), pages 1-20, November.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jgames:v:4:y:2013:i:4:p:670-689:d:30528
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4336/4/4/670/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4336/4/4/670/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Itoh, Hideshi, 1994. "Job design, delegation and cooperation: A principal-agent analysis," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 38(3-4), pages 691-700, April.
    2. Drew Fudenberg & David Levine & Eric Maskin, 2008. "The Folk Theorem With Imperfect Public Information," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Drew Fudenberg & David K Levine (ed.), A Long-Run Collaboration On Long-Run Games, chapter 12, pages 231-273, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    3. Ramakrishnan, Ram T S & Thakor, Anjan V, 1991. "Cooperation versus Competition in Agency," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 7(2), pages 248-283, Fall.
    4. Dilip Mookherjee, 1984. "Optimal Incentive Schemes with Many Agents," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 51(3), pages 433-446.
    5. Barlo, Mehmet & Özdog˜an, Ayça, 2014. "Optimality of linearity with collusion and renegotiation," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 46-52.
    6. Jean-Jacques Laffont & David Martimort, 2000. "Mechanism Design with Collusion and Correlation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 68(2), pages 309-342, March.
    7. Martin F. Hellwig & Klaus M. Schmidt, 2002. "Discrete-Time Approximations of the Holmstrom-Milgrom Brownian-Motion Model of Intertemporal Incentive Provision," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(6), pages 2225-2264, November.
    8. Bengt Holmstrom, 1982. "Moral Hazard in Teams," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 13(2), pages 324-340, Autumn.
    9. Leonardo Felli, 1996. "Preventing Collusion Through Discretion," STICERD - Theoretical Economics Paper Series /1996/303, Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, LSE.
    10. Ma, Ching-to & Moore, John & Turnbull, Stephen, 1988. "Stopping agents from "cheating"," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 355-372, December.
    11. Holmstrom, Bengt & Milgrom, Paul, 1987. "Aggregation and Linearity in the Provision of Intertemporal Incentives," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 55(2), pages 303-328, March.
    12. Demski, Joel S. & Sappington, David, 1984. "Optimal incentive contracts with multiple agents," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 152-171, June.
    13. Baliga, Sandeep & Sjostrom, Tomas, 1998. "Decentralization and Collusion," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 196-232, December.
    14. Grossman, Sanford J & Hart, Oliver D, 1983. "An Analysis of the Principal-Agent Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 51(1), pages 7-45, January.
    15. Demski, Joel S. & Sappington, David E. M. & Spiller, Pablo T., 1988. "Incentive schemes with multiple agents and bankruptcy constraints," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 44(1), pages 156-167, February.
    16. Inés Macho‐Stadler & J. David Pérez‐Castrillo, 1998. "Centralized and Decentralized Contracts in a Moral Hazard Environment," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(4), pages 489-510, December.
    17. Jelovac, Izabela & Macho-Stadler, Ines, 2002. "Comparing organizational structures in health services," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 501-522, December.
    18. Itoh Hideshi, 1993. "Coalitions, Incentives, and Risk Sharing," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 410-427, August.
    19. Itoh, Hideshi, 1991. "Incentives to Help in Multi-agent Situations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 59(3), pages 611-636, May.
    20. Rafael Hortala‐Vallve & Miguel Sanchez Villalba, 2010. "Internalizing Team Production Externalities through Delegation: The British Passenger Rail Sector as an Example," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 77(308), pages 785-792, October.
    21. Jean‐Jacques Laffont & Jean‐Charles Rochet, 1997. "Collusion in Organizations," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 99(4), pages 485-495, December.
    22. Jaeyoung Sung, 1995. "Linearity with Project Selection and Controllable Diffusion Rate in Continuous-Time Principal-Agent Problems," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 26(4), pages 720-743, Winter.
    23. Laffont, Jean-Jacques & Rochet, Jean-Charles, 1997. " Collusion in Organizations," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 99(4), pages 485-495, December.
    24. Tirole, Jean, 1986. "Hierarchies and Bureaucracies: On the Role of Collusion in Organizations," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 2(2), pages 181-214, Fall.
    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. Barlo, Mehmet & Özdog˜an, Ayça, 2014. "Optimality of linearity with collusion and renegotiation," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 46-52.

    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. Barlo, Mehmet & Ayca, Ozdogan, 2012. "Team beats collusion," MPRA Paper 37449, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Rafael Hortala‐Vallve & Miguel Sanchez Villalba, 2010. "Internalizing Team Production Externalities through Delegation: The British Passenger Rail Sector as an Example," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 77(308), pages 785-792, October.
    3. Fleckinger, Pierre & Martimort, David & Roux, Nicolas, 2023. "Should They Compete or Should They Cooperate? The View of Agency Theory," TSE Working Papers 23-1421, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE), revised Jan 2024.
    4. Rafael Hortala-Vallve & Miguel Sanchez, 2005. "Hierarchic contracting," STICERD - Distributional Analysis Research Programme Papers 73, Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, LSE.
    5. Sanchez, Miguel A. & Hortala-Vallve, Rafael, 2005. "Hierarchic contracting," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 6548, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    6. Armstrong, Mark & Sappington, David E.M., 2007. "Recent Developments in the Theory of Regulation," Handbook of Industrial Organization, in: Mark Armstrong & Robert Porter (ed.), Handbook of Industrial Organization, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 27, pages 1557-1700, Elsevier.
    7. Fleckinger, Pierre, 2012. "Correlation and relative performance evaluation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 147(1), pages 93-117.
    8. Barlo, Mehmet & Özdog˜an, Ayça, 2014. "Optimality of linearity with collusion and renegotiation," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 46-52.
    9. Romuald Elie & Dylan Possamai, 2016. "Contracting theory with competitive interacting agents," Papers 1605.08099, arXiv.org.
    10. Pierre Fleckinger, 2007. "On Multiagent Moral Hazard under Technological Uncertainty," Working Papers hal-00240716, HAL.
    11. Antoine Faure-Grimaud & Jean-Jacques Laffont & David Martimort, 2003. "Collusion, Delegation and Supervision with Soft Information," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 70(2), pages 253-279.
    12. ,, 2015. "Unraveling in a repeated moral hazard model with multiple agents," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 10(1), January.
    13. Angelucci, Charles & Russo, Antonio, 2012. "Moral Hazard in Hierarchies and Soft Information," TSE Working Papers 12-343, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    14. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2373-2437 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Yeon-Koo Che & Seung-Weon Yoo, 2001. "Optimal Incentives for Teams," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(3), pages 525-541, June.
    16. Baliga, Sandeep & Sjostrom, Tomas, 1998. "Decentralization and Collusion," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 196-232, December.
    17. Gerald A. Feltham & Christian Hofmann, 2007. "Limited Commitment in Multi†agent Contracting," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 24(2), pages 345-375, June.
    18. Chen, Bo, 2012. "All-or-nothing payments," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(3), pages 133-142.
    19. William Chan & Priscilla Man, 2012. "Help and Factionalism in Politics and Organizations," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 79(1), pages 144-160, July.
    20. Jonathan Glover & Eunhee Kim, 2021. "Optimal Team Composition: Diversity to Foster Implicit Team Incentives," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(9), pages 5800-5820, September.
    21. Alice Peng-Ju Su, 2019. "Team incentives with imperfect mutual inference," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 48(2), pages 687-712, June.

    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:gam:jgames:v:4:y:2013:i:4:p:670-689:d:30528. 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: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    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.