We analyze a model of conflict with endogenous choice of effort, where subsets of the contenders may force the resolution to be sequential: First the alliance fights it out with the rest and – in case they win – later they fight it out among themselves. For three-player games, we find that it will not be in the interest of any two of them to form an alliance. We obtain this result under two dif...

This paper, which builds on Chipman (The economist’s vision. Essays in modern economic perspectives, 131–162, 1998), analyzes a simple model formulated by Hurwicz (Jpn World Econ 7:49–74, 1995) of two agents—a polluter and a pollutee—and two commodities: “money” (standing for an exchangeable private good desired by both agents) and “pollution” (a public commodity desired by the polluter but und...

This paper explores the extent to which ex ante transaction costs may lead to failures of the Coase Theorem. In particular we identify the basic hold-up problem that arises whenever the parties to a Coasian negotiation have to pay ex ante costs for the negotiation to take place. We then show that a Coasian solution to this problem is not available: a Coasian solution typically entails a negotia...

We develop a new perspective on the boundary of the firm that is consistent with the empirical observation that the share of entrepreneurs first decreases and then increases in the course of economic development. Existing theory based on transaction costs (Coase, 1937, and subsequent literature) is difficult to relate to these well-established dynamics. Our approach focuses on changing incentiv...

We present a simple classroom principal-agent experiment that can effectively be used as a teaching device to introduce important concepts of organizational economics and contracting. In a first part, students take the role of a principal and design a contract that consists of a fixed payment and an incentive component. In the second part, students take the role of agents and decide on an effor...

O presente artigo compara a previdência social brasileira com o sistema previdenciário dos Estados Unidos partir da teoria denominada Análise Econômica do Direito (AED). Para construir ideia central, foi realizada pesquisa bibliográfica em artigos científicos e sites institucionais, utilizando-se obra “The Problem of The Social Cost”, de Ronald Coase, como marco teórico pesquisa. No primeiro ca...