Incentive-Enhancing Preferences: Personality, Behavior and Earnings
Suppose there is a principal-agent relationship between employer and employee in which effort is not contractible, but is elicited through employer incentive mechanisms. We term preferences that allow the employer to elicit effort at lower cost incentive enhancing. We analyze how such preferences affect earnings, and then provide evidence that one of the relevant behavioral traits, efficacy, as well as other psychological aspects of individuals, are signifiant influences on earnings. We conclude that measures of cognitive performance are not sufficient indicators of the effectiveness of schools in promoting student labor market success, incentive enhancing preferences are irreducibly heterogeneous, incentive enhancing preferences help explain the persistence of poverty over generations within families and, unlike cognitive skills, incentive-enhancing traits need not be welfare increasing for their bearers.
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| Length: | |
| Date of creation: | Jan 2001 |
| Date of revision: | |
| Handle: | RePEc:wop:safiwp:01-01-004 |
| Contact details of provider: | Postal: 1399 Hyde Park Road, Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 Web page: http://www.santafe.edu/sfi/publications/working-papers.html More information through EDIRC
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References listed on IDEAS
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- Heckman, James J., 2000.
"Policies to foster human capital,"
Research in Economics,
Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 3-56, March.
- James Heckman, 2011. "Policies to foster human capital," Educational Studies, Higher School of Economics, issue 3, pages 73-137.
- James J. Heckman, 2000. "Policies to Foster Human Capital," JCPR Working Papers 154, Northwestern University/University of Chicago Joint Center for Poverty Research.
- James Heckman, 2000. "Policies to Foster Human Capital," Working Papers 0028, Harris School of Public Policy Studies, University of Chicago.
- James J. Heckman, 1999. "Policies to Foster Human Capital," NBER Working Papers 7288, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Samuel Bowles & Herbert Gintis & Melissa Osborne, 2000. "The Determinants of Earnings: Skills, Preferences, and Schooling," UMASS Amherst Economics Working Papers 2000-07, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Economics.
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