We consider a multi-armed bandit model in which two players choose between learning about the quality of a risky option (modelled as a Poisson process with unknown arrival rate), and competing for the use of a single shared safe option that can only be used by one agent at the time. Firstly, when players cannot reverse their decision to switch to the safe option, the socially optimal policy mak...

The evidence that earnings rise with firm size and that human capital affects earnings based on labour market data are two of the most robust empirical findings in economics. In contrast the evidence for scale economies in firm data is very weak. The limited direct evidence of human capital on firm productivity suggests that human capital is indeed productive and that the magnitudes are consist...

This paper examines the existence and magnitude of network e¤ects in the matching of workteams. We study the formation of co-author relations among economists over a thirty year period. Our principal …nding is that a collaboration emerges faster among two authors if they are closer in the social network of economists. This proximity e¤ect on collaboration is strong and robust but only a¤ects in...

This paper studies contract selection between efficiency wages and subjective performance pay to motivate workers in a market setting. The optimal wage contract (which may be a combination of efficiency wages and subjective performance pay) is determined by turnover costs in labor markets. Specifically, labor markets with higher turnover costs use more subjective performance pay and less effici...

Breach remedies serve an important role in protecting relationship-specific investments. The theoretical literature predicts that some commonly used types of breach remedies may protect too well, in the sense that they induce overinvestment. The driving forces behind this result are the complete insurance against potential separation that breach remedies may provide, and the possibility to prev...

The Provision of Wage Insurance by the Firm: Evidence from a Longitudinal Matched Employer-Employee Dataset We evaluate the impact of product market uncertainty on workers wages, addressing the questions: To what extent do firms provide insurance to their workforce, insulating their wages from shocks in product markets? How does the amount of insurance provided vary with firm and worker attribu...

This report is divided into two sections. In the first section, the focus is on adaptive transform-based image compression and motion compensation at low bit rates. A new adalptive algorithm for image representation and coding is introduced. This algorithm is based on the concept of segmented orthogonal matching pursuits (SOMP), and adaptively selects the best representation from an overcomplet...

The use of part-time jobs is steadily increasing in most advanced economies. Previous literature has concluded that part-time workers suffer a wage penalty, but its magnitude varies across studies and countries. The part-time penalty is the otherwise unexplained element of the gap between full-time and part-time hourly earnings. One potential factor accounting for international differences in t...

Cyclical Movements in Unemployment and Informality in Developing Countries This paper analyzes the cyclical properties of worker flows in Brazil and Mexico, two important developing countries with large unregulated or “informal” sectors. It generates three stylized facts that are critical to the accurate modeling of the sector and which suggest the need to rethink the approaches to date. First,...

We study the optimal incentive scheme for a multistage project in which the agent privately observes intermediate progress. The optimal contract involves a soft deadline wherein the principal guarantees funding up to a certain date – if the agent reports progress at that date, then the principal gives him a relatively short hard deadline to complete the project – if progress is not reported at ...