Essays in dynamic contracting

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Economics, 2012.

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Kwon, Suehyun
Other Authors: Glenn Ellison and Muhamet Yildiz.
Format: Thesis
Language:eng
Published: Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2012
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/72933
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author Kwon, Suehyun
author2 Glenn Ellison and Muhamet Yildiz.
author_facet Glenn Ellison and Muhamet Yildiz.
Kwon, Suehyun
author_sort Kwon, Suehyun
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description Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Economics, 2012.
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spelling mit-1721.1/729332019-04-10T07:45:34Z Essays in dynamic contracting Kwon, Suehyun Glenn Ellison and Muhamet Yildiz. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Economics. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Economics. Economics. Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Economics, 2012. Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. Includes bibliographical references. This thesis examines three models of dynamic contracting. The first model is a model of dynamic moral hazard with partially persistent states, and the second model considers relational contracts when the states are partially persistent. The last model studies preference for delegation with learning. In the first chapter, the costly unobservable action of the agent produces a good outcome with some probability, and the probability of the good outcome corresponds to the state. The states are unobservable and follow an irreducible Markov chain with positive persistence. The chapter finds that an informational rent arises in this environment. The second best contract resembles a tenure system: the agent is paid nothing during the probationary period, and once he is paid, the principal never takes his outside option again. The second best contract becomes stationary after the agent is tenured. For discount factors close to one, the principal can approximate his first best payoff with review contracts. The second chapter studies relational contracts with partially persistent states, where the distribution of the state depends on the previous state. When the states are observable, the optimal contracts can be stationary, and the self-enforcement leads to the dynamic enforcement constraint as with i.i.d. states. The chapter then applies the results to study the implications for the markets where the principal and the agent can be matched with new partners. The third chapter studies preference for delegation when there is a possibility of learning before taking an action. The optimal action depends on the unobservable state. After the principal chooses the manager, one of the agents may receive a private signal about the world. The agent decides whether to disclose the signal to the manager, and the manager chooses an action. In an equilibrium, the agents' communication strategies depend on the manager's prior. The principal prefers a manager with some difference in prior belief to a manager with the same prior. by Suehyun Kwon. Ph.D. 2012-09-13T19:36:36Z 2012-09-13T19:36:36Z 2012 2012 Thesis http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/72933 807049548 eng M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission. http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582 142 p. application/pdf Massachusetts Institute of Technology
spellingShingle Economics.
Kwon, Suehyun
Essays in dynamic contracting
title Essays in dynamic contracting
title_full Essays in dynamic contracting
title_fullStr Essays in dynamic contracting
title_full_unstemmed Essays in dynamic contracting
title_short Essays in dynamic contracting
title_sort essays in dynamic contracting
topic Economics.
url http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/72933
work_keys_str_mv AT kwonsuehyun essaysindynamiccontracting