IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/oxf/wpaper/347.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Model of Delegated Project Choice With Application to Merger Policy

Author

Listed:
  • John Vickers
  • Mark Armstrong

Abstract

We present a model in which a principal delegates the choice of project to an agent with different preferences. A project`s characteristics are verifiable once presented to the principal, but the principal does not know how many projects are available to the agent. The principal chooses the set of projects which the agent can implement. Three frameworks are considered: (i) a static setting in which the set of available projects is exogenous to the agent but uncertain; (ii) a dynamic setting in which by expending effort the agent can affect the number of projects, and (iii) a dynamic setting in which the agent must wait for projects to materialize. The model is applied to the choice of welfare standard for merger policy.

Suggested Citation

  • John Vickers & Mark Armstrong, 2007. "A Model of Delegated Project Choice With Application to Merger Policy," Economics Series Working Papers 347, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:oxf:wpaper:347
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:bdf5d6fa-efb0-4964-ab09-a11d32c2b8a8
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ricardo Alonso & Niko Matouschek, 2008. "Optimal Delegation," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 75(1), pages 259-293.
    2. Aghion, Philippe & Tirole, Jean, 1997. "Formal and Real Authority in Organizations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(1), pages 1-29, February.
    3. Armstrong, Mark, 1995. "Delegation and discretion," MPRA Paper 17069, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Fridolfsson, Sven-Olof, 2007. "A Consumer Surplus Defense in Merger Control," Working Paper Series 686, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    5. repec:ner:ucllon:http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/17678/ is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Joseph Farrell & Michael Katz, 2006. "The Economics of Welfare Standards in Antitrust," CPI Journal, Competition Policy International, vol. 2.
    7. Armstrong, M., 1994. "Delegation and discretion," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 9421, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    8. Baker, George & Gibbons, Robert & Murphy, Kevin J, 1999. "Informal Authority in Organizations," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 15(1), pages 56-73, April.
    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. Weese, Eric, 2008. "Political Mergers as Coalition Formation : Evidence from Japanese Municipal Amalgamations," CCES Discussion Paper Series 5, Center for Research on Contemporary Economic Systems, Graduate School of Economics, Hitotsubashi University.

    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. Mark Armstrong & John Vickers, 2010. "A Model of Delegated Project Choice," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 78(1), pages 213-244, January.
    2. Kirsten Foss & Nicolai J. Foss, "undated". "Authority and Discretion: Tensions, Credible Delegation, and Implications for New Organizational Forms," IVS/CBS Working Papers 2002-08, Department of Industrial Economics and Strategy, Copenhagen Business School.
    3. Miriam Schütte & Philipp Christoph Wichardt, 2013. "Delegation and Interim Performance Evaluation," CESifo Working Paper Series 4193, CESifo.
    4. Anthony M. Marino & John G. Matsusaka & Jan Zabojnik, 2006. "Disobedience And Authority," Working Paper 1109, Economics Department, Queen's University.
    5. Tigran Melkonyan, 2014. "Decentralization, Incentive Contracts and the Effect of Distortions in Performance Measures," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 82(6), pages 631-652, December.
    6. Takashi Shimizu, 2017. "Cheap talk with an exit option: a model of exit and voice," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 46(4), pages 1071-1088, November.
    7. Murali Agastya & Parimal Kanti Bag & Indranil Chakraborty, 2014. "Communication and authority with a partially informed expert," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 45(1), pages 176-197, March.
    8. Daron Acemoglu & Philippe Aghion & Claire Lelarge & John Van Reenen & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2007. "Technology, Information, and the Decentralization of the Firm," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(4), pages 1759-1799.
    9. Nicholas Bloom & Luis Garicano & Raffaella Sadun & John Van Reenen, 2014. "The Distinct Effects of Information Technology and Communication Technology on Firm Organization," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(12), pages 2859-2885, December.
    10. Martimort, David & Semenov, Aggey, 2008. "The informational effects of competition and collusion in legislative politics," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(7), pages 1541-1563, July.
    11. Jeremy C. Stein, 2002. "Information Production and Capital Allocation: Decentralized versus Hierarchical Firms," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(5), pages 1891-1921, October.
    12. Ernst Fehr & Holger Herz & Tom Wilkening, 2013. "The Lure of Authority: Motivation and Incentive Effects of Power," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(4), pages 1325-1359, June.
    13. Nicholas Bloom & Raffaella Sadun, 2012. "The Organization of Firms Across Countries," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(4), pages 1663-1705.
    14. Michael Raith, 2008. "Specific knowledge and performance measurement," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 39(4), pages 1059-1079, December.
    15. David Gaddis Ross, 2012. "On Evaluation Costs in Strategic Factor Markets: The Implications for Competition and Organizational Design," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(4), pages 791-804, April.
    16. Nicholas Bloom & Raffaella Sadun & John Van Reenen, 2010. "Does Product Market Competition Lead Firms to Decentralize?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 434-438, May.
    17. Luis Garicano & Richard A. Posner, 2005. "Intelligence Failures: An Organizational Economics Perspective," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 19(4), pages 151-170, Fall.
    18. Mitchell Hoffman & Lisa B Kahn & Danielle Li, 2018. "Discretion in Hiring," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(2), pages 765-800.
    19. Chen, Qi & Vashishtha, Rahul, 2017. "The effects of bank mergers on corporate information disclosure," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 56-77.
    20. Jed De Varo & Suraj Prasad, 2015. "The Relationship between Delegation and Incentives Across Occupations: Evidence and Theory," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 63(2), pages 279-312, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Delegation; Principal-Agent; Search; Merger Policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
    • L4 - Industrial Organization - - Antitrust Issues and Policies

    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:oxf:wpaper:347. 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: Anne Pouliquen (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sfeixuk.html .

    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.