IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cla/uclawp/556.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Up-or-Out Contracts: A Signaling Perspective

Author

Listed:
  • Michael Waldman

    (UCLA)

Abstract

A firm will typically gather information concerning its own workers that is not available to other potential employers, while other firms will attempt to reduce this information asymmetry by observing the actions of the initial employer. The author argues that this process can be important in environments characterized by up-or-out contracts in that the retentions decision can serve as a signal of productivity. The article investigates this argument in an environment where in-or-out contracts are employed because they provide workers with an incentive to accumulate general human capital and where learning takes place in a diffuse fashion. Copyright 1990 by University of Chicago Press.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Waldman, 1989. "Up-or-Out Contracts: A Signaling Perspective," UCLA Economics Working Papers 556, UCLA Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:cla:uclawp:556
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.econ.ucla.edu/workingpapers/wp556.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Novos, I.E., 1988. "Worker Preferences And Firm Structure," Papers m8821, Southern California - Department of Economics.
    2. Paul Milgrom & Sharon Oster, 1987. "Job Discrimination, Market Forces, and the Invisibility Hypothesis," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 102(3), pages 453-476.
    3. MacDonald, Glenn M, 1982. "A Market Equilibrium Theory of Job Assignment and Sequential Accumulation of Information," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 72(5), pages 1038-1055, December.
    4. Michael Waldman, 1984. "Job Assignments, Signalling, and Efficiency," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(2), pages 255-267, Summer.
    5. 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.
    6. Rosen, Sherwin, 2007. "Studies in Labor Markets," National Bureau of Economic Research Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226726304, August.
    7. repec:ucp:bknber:9780226726281 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Kahn, Charles & Huberman, Gur, 1988. "Two-sided Uncertainty and "Up-or-Out" Contracts," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 6(4), pages 423-444, October.
    9. Edward P. Lazear, 1984. "Raids and Offermatching," NBER Working Papers 1419, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Prescott, Edward C & Visscher, Michael, 1980. "Organization Capital," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 88(3), pages 446-461, June.
    11. Ricart i Costa, Joan E, 1988. "Managerial Task Assignment and Promotions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 56(2), pages 449-466, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Michael Waldman, 1990. "A Signalling Explanation for Seniority Based Promotions and Other Labor Market Puzzles," UCLA Economics Working Papers 599, UCLA Department of Economics.
    2. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2373-2437 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Carolyn Pitchik, 2008. "Self-Promoting Investments," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 164(3), pages 381-406, September.
    4. Robert Gibbons & Michael Waldman, 1998. "A Theory of Wage and Promotion Dynamics in Internal Labor Markets," NBER Working Papers 6454, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Xin Jin, 2014. "The Signaling Role of Not Being Promoted: Theory and Evidence," Working Papers 0314, University of South Florida, Department of Economics.
    6. Jin, Xin, 2014. "The Signaling Role of Note Being Promoted: Theory and Evidence," MPRA Paper 58484, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Waldman, Michael, 2013. "Classic promotion tournaments versus market-based tournaments," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 198-210.
    8. Jed DeVaro & Michael Waldman, 2012. "The Signaling Role of Promotions: Further Theory and Empirical Evidence," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 30(1), pages 91-147.
    9. Waldman, Michael, 1996. "Asymmetric learning and the wage/productivity relationship," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 419-429, December.
    10. Robert Gibbons, 1996. "Incentives and Careers in Organizations," NBER Working Papers 5705, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Waldman, Michael, 1989. "Information on worker ability : An analysis of investment within the firm," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 4(1), pages 57-80.
    12. Gibbons, Robert & Katz, Lawrence F, 1991. "Layoffs and Lemons," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(4), pages 351-380, October.
    13. Jed DeVaro & Suman Ghosh & Cindy Zoghi, 2018. "Job Characteristics and Labor Market Discrimination in Promotions," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(3), pages 389-434, July.
    14. Heski Bar-Isaac & Raphaël Lévy, 2022. "Motivating Employees through Career Paths," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 40(1), pages 95-131.
    15. Kameshwari Shankar & Suman Ghosh, 2005. "Favorable Selection in the Labor Market: A Theory of Worker Mobility in R&D Intensive Industries," Working Papers 05006, Department of Economics, College of Business, Florida Atlantic University.
    16. Dato, Simon & Grunewald, Andreas & Kräkel, Matthias & Müller, Daniel, 2016. "Asymmetric employer information, promotions, and the wage policy of firms," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 273-300.
    17. Edward P. Lazear, 1995. "Personnel Economics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262121883, December.
    18. Jed DeVaro & Oliver Gürtler, 2020. "Strategic shirking in competitive labor markets: A general model of multi‐task promotion tournaments with employer learning," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(2), pages 335-376, April.
    19. Cassidy, Hugh & DeVaro, Jed & Kauhanen, Antti, 2016. "Promotion signaling, gender, and turnover: New theory and evidence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 126(PA), pages 140-166.
    20. De Fraja, Gianni, 2004. "Hierarchies in organisations and labour market competition," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(6), pages 669-686, December.
    21. Alexander K. Koch & Eloïc Peyrache, 2011. "Aligning Ambition and Incentives," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 27(3), pages 655-688.

    More about this item

    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:cla:uclawp:556. 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: David K. Levine (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.econ.ucla.edu/ .

    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.