In this chapter we study dynamic incentive models in which risk sharing is endogenously limited by the presence of informational or enforcement frictions. We comprehensively overview one of the most important tools for the analysis such problems—the theory of recursive contracts. Recursive...

This paper investigates whether assuming that households possess advance information on their income shocks helps to overcome the difficulty of standard models to understand consumption insurance in the US. As our main result, we find that the quantitative relevance of advance information...

Using an agency model, we show how delegation, by generating additional private information, improves dynamic incentives under limited commitment. It circumvents ratchet effects and facilitates the revelation of persistent private information through two effects: a play-hardball effect, which...

A unilateral policy intervention by a country (such as the introduction of an emission price) can induce firms to relocate to other countries. We analyze a dynamic game where a regulator offers contracts to avert relocation of a firm in each of two periods. The firm can undertake a...

We characterize optimal incentive contracts in a moral hazard framework extended in two directions. First, after effort provision, the agent is free to leave and pursue some ex-post outside option. Second, the value of this outside option is increasing in effort, and hence endogenous. Optimal...

In a globalized economy, firms move production to other countries without turning a hair. A local policy maker who seeks to avert relocation faces a dynamic problem - incentivizing the firm to remain in its home country today does not guarantee that the firm also stays in the future. We...

I study the optimal audit mechanism when the principal cannot commit to an audit strategy. Invoking a relevation principle, the agent reports her type to a mediator whi assigns contracts and recommends the principla whether to audit. For each reported type the mediator randomizes over a...

We study dynamic contracting with adverse selection and limited commitment. A firm (the principal) and a worker (the agent) interact for potentially infinitely many periods. The worker is privately informed about his productivity and the firm can only commit to short-term contracts. The ratchet...

A buyer wishes to purchase a durable good from a seller who in each period chooses a mechanism under limited commitment. The buyer's value is binary and fully persistent. We show that posted prices implement all equilibrium outcomes of an infinite-horizon, mechanism-selection game. Despite being...