In a patent thicket licensing provides a mechanism to either avoid or resolve hold up. We study the choice between ex ante licensing to avoid hold up and ex post licensing to resolve it. Firms’ choice of licensing contract is studied in the context of a patent portfolio race. We show that high expected blocking leads to ex ante licensing while ex post licensing arises if expected blocking is lo...

In this paper we suggest a framework to assess the degree of reliability of provisional estimates as forecasts of nal data, and we reexamine the question of the most appropriate way in which available data should be used for ex ante forecasting in the presence of a data revision process. Various desirable properties for provisional data are suggested, as well as procedures for testing them, tak...

Yes. A country’s suitability for EMU entry depends on the intensity of trade with EMU members, and the extent to which its business cycles are correlated with those of other members. But both international trade patterns and international business cycle correlations are endogenous. Theoretically, economic integration has an ambiguous effect on the degree to which business cycles are correlated ...

This paper develops a novel positive model of informal contracting in which rewards and punishments are not determined by an ex ante optimal plan but instead express the ex post moral sentiments of the arbitrating party. We consider a subjective performance evaluation problem in which a principal can privately assess the contribution of an agent to the welfare of a broader group. In the absence...

Economics; he would like to thank that institution for its hospitality. Abstract We view a contract as a list of outcomes. Ex ante, the parties commit not to consider outcomes not on the list, i.e., these are " ruled out ". Ex post, they freely bargain over outcomes on the list, i.e., the contract specifies no mechanism to structure their choice; in this sense outcomes on the list are not " rul...

I develop a model of R&D cooperation with uncertain research outcomes. In this model asymmetric outcomes of R&D competition emerge naturally. Therefore ex-ante and ex-post R&D cooperation can be studied as alternatives for firms. Using this model I compare welfare losses under ex-ante and ex-post R&D cooperation as the degree of product market competition varies. It emerges that the relative si...

We study if and how social preferences extend to risky environments. We provide experimental evidence from different versions of dictator games with risky outcomes, and establish that preferences that are exclusively based on ex post or on ex ante comparisons cannot generate the observed behavioral patterns. The more money decision-makers transfer in the standard dictator game, the more likely ...