This paper studies optimal menus of debt contracts such as secured debentures or bonds, in the presence of diversity of opinions between borrowers and lenders. We first characterize incentive compatible contracts, then prove the existence of optimal debt contracts. Finally, we are able to explicitly characterize such optimal menus within a specific case: we notably show that borrowers optimally...

An increasing number of environmental protection programs offers financial compensation to farmers in exchange for conservation services. Incentive-compatible contracts can be designed to mitigate excess compensation, but the extant literature suggests that outcomes are always second-best so that other instruments (such as conservation auctions) may be preferred. We argue that the claim regardi...

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, fa...

We examine information aggregation regarding industry capital productivity from privately informed managers in a dynamic model with optimal incentive contracts. Information cascades always occur if managers enjoy limited liability: when beliefs regarding productivity become endogenously extreme (optimistic or pessimistic), learning stops. There is no learning if initial beliefs are extreme, or ...

Whether incentive contracts perform better than trust in terms of productive efficiency is usually explored by principal-agent experiments (most involving only one agent). We investigate this issue in the context of a three-person ultimatum experiment, which is simpler and more neutrally framed than traditional principal-agent designs. Contrary to the game theoretic prediction, we find that (mu...

In insurance economies with a continuum of agents and adverse selection, it is shown that incentive-constrained Pareto efficient allocations correspond to regulated competitive (or compensated competitive) equilibria in markets with non-linear pricing for options to buy insurance contracts. These options make the incentive constraints self-enforcing. Efficiency is achieved through a “universal ...

Meckling (1992) argue that moving a decision away from the inherently best-informed party involves costs in communication and garbling but may lodge it with someone who has better incentives to make good decisions. But generally we expect that incentives are part of the organizational design. Why not just provide incentives to those with the best information so that they make the right decision...

A principal-agent (P-A) model is used to analyse the effect of environmental performance indicators (EPI) on environmental risk sharing within the firm. To achieve due diligence, the principal (top management), having to use imperfect performance indicators and fearing penalties for environmental damages, wants to avoid environmental harm and induce the agent (employee manipulating hazardous ma...