IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cte/werepe/38519.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Optimal contracts when the players think different

Author

Listed:
  • Dumav, Martin
  • Khan, Urmee
  • Rigotti, Luca

Abstract

In a moral hazard model with heterogeneous beliefs, we show that the efficient risksharing contract does not result in a constant wage and the optimal first-best contract may not be increasing in output. When actions are unobservable, heterogeneity in beliefs implies that the monotone likelihood ratio ranking does not ensure that the wage scheme in the optimal contract is non-decreasing in output. This is because differences in beliefs may affect the incentive provision in a non-monotone way. The standard monotonicity result with common beliefs extends to belief heterogeneity when the agent is more optimistic than the principal. Yet, in the reverse case, the optimal contract can be non-monotone.

Suggested Citation

  • Dumav, Martin & Khan, Urmee & Rigotti, Luca, 2023. "Optimal contracts when the players think different," UC3M Working papers. Economics 38519, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Economía.
    • Handle: RePEc:cte:werepe:38519
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://e-archivo.uc3m.es/bitstream/handle/10016/38519/we2307.pdf?sequence=1
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Luís Santos-Pinto, 2008. "Positive Self-image and Incentives in Organisations," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(531), pages 1315-1332, August.
    2. Grossman, Sanford J & Hart, Oliver D, 1983. "An Analysis of the Principal-Agent Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 51(1), pages 7-45, January.
    3. de la Rosa, Leonidas Enrique, 2011. "Overconfidence and moral hazard," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 429-451.
    4. Lopomo, Giuseppe & Rigotti, Luca & Shannon, Chris, 2011. "Knightian uncertainty and moral hazard," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 146(3), pages 1148-1172, May.
    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. de la Rosa, Leonidas Enrique, 2011. "Overconfidence and moral hazard," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 429-451.
    2. Kim, Jaesoo, 2015. "Managerial beliefs and incentive policies," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 84-95.
    3. FOSCHI, Matteo; SANTOS-PINTO, Luís Pedro, 2017. "Subjective Performance Evaluation of Employees with Biased Beliefs," Economics Working Papers ECO 2017/08, European University Institute.
    4. Sarah Auster, 2012. "Asymmetric Awareness and Moral Hazard," Economics Working Papers ECO2012/23, European University Institute.
    5. Sarah Auster, 2011. "Asymmetric Awareness and Moral Hazard," Economics Working Papers ECO2011/, European University Institute.
    6. Auster, Sarah, 2013. "Asymmetric awareness and moral hazard," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 503-521.
    7. Inés Macho-Stadler & David Pérez-Castrillo, 2018. "Moral hazard: Base models and two extensions," Chapters, in: Luis C. Corchón & Marco A. Marini (ed.), Handbook of Game Theory and Industrial Organization, Volume I, chapter 16, pages 453-485, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    8. Luís Santos-Pinto, 2010. "Positive Self-Image In Tournaments," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 51(2), pages 475-496, May.
    9. Luís Santos-Pinto, 2008. "Positive Self-image and Incentives in Organisations," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(531), pages 1315-1332, August.
    10. Clara Graziano & Annalisa Luporini, 2022. "Do Firms Gain from Managerial Overconfidence? The Role of Severance Pay," CESifo Working Paper Series 9801, CESifo.
    11. Huffman, David B. & Raymond, Collin & Shvets, Julia, 2023. "Persistent Overconfidence and Biased Memory: Evidence from Managers," IZA Discussion Papers 16283, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Sloof, Randolph & van Praag, C. Mirjam, 2010. "The effect of noise in a performance measure on work motivation: A real effort laboratory experiment," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 751-765, October.
    13. Clemens Buchen & Alberto Palermo, 2020. "A biased firm in a market with complementary products. A note on the welfare effects," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 67(4), pages 448-453, September.
    14. Huber, Stefanie J. & Schmidt, Tobias, 2022. "Nevertheless, they persist: Cross-country differences in homeownership behavior," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    15. Fang, Hanming & Wu, Zenan, 2020. "Life insurance and life settlement markets with overconfident policyholders," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    16. Dumav, Martin & Khan, Urmee, 2018. "Moral hazard with non-additive uncertainty: When are actions implementable?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 171(C), pages 110-114.
    17. Wenner, Lukas M., 2018. "Do sellers exploit biased beliefs of buyers? An experiment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 194-215.
    18. Martimort, David & Iossa, Elisabetta, 2013. "Hidden Action or Hidden Information? How Information Gathering Shapes Contract Design," CEPR Discussion Papers 9552, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    19. Carroll, Gabriel & Bolte, Lukas, 2023. "Robust contracting under double moral hazard," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 18(4), November.
    20. Ludwig, Sandra & Wichardt, Philip C. & Wickhorst, Hanke, 2011. "On the Positive Effects of Overcon fident Self-Perception in Teams," Discussion Papers in Economics 12246, University of Munich, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Contracting;

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D86 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Economics of Contract Law
    • M52 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Personnel Economics - - - Compensation and Compensation Methods and Their Effects

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:cte:werepe:38519. 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: Ana Poveda (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.eco.uc3m.es/ .

    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.