Our paper evaluates recent regulatory proposals mandating the deferral of bonus payments and claw-back clauses in the financial sector. We study a broadly applicable principal agent setting, in which the agent exerts effort for an immediately observable task (acquisition) and a task for which...

This paper provides a complete characterization of optimal contracts in principal-agent settings where the agent's action has persistent effects. We model general information environments via the stochastic process of the likelihood-ratio. The martingale property of this performance metric...

We study non-contractible intangible investment in a dynamic agency model with multitasking. The manager's short-term task determines current performance which deteriorates with investment in the firm's future profitability, his long-term task. The optimal contract dynamically balances...

We investigate compensation design in tight labor markets. With private information about firm productivity, firms prefer competing for workers by raising fixed wages. However, workers in better bargaining positions often prefer negotiating for higher bonuses or option pay. We characterize when...