Browsing Discussion papers (FOR) by Author "Kvaløy, Ola"

Now showing items 1-14 of 14

    • Asset specificity and vertical integration 

      Kvaløy, Ola (Discussion paper, Working paper, 2003-09)
      Asset specificity is usually considered to be an argument for vertical integration. The main idea is that specificity induces opportunistic behaviour, and that vertical integration reduces this problem of opportunism. In ...

    • Balanced scorecards: a relational contract approach 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper;3/20, Working paper, 2020-05-08)
      Reward systems based on balanced scorecards typically connect pay to an index, i.e. a weighted sum of multiple performance measures. However, there is no formal incentive model that actually describe this kind of index ...

    • Cooperation in knowledge-intensive firms 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper, Working paper, 2007-07)
      The extent to which a knowledge-intensive firm should induce cooperation between its employees is analyzed in a model of relational contracting between a firm (principal) and its employees (two agents). The agents can ...

    • Crime and punishment: When tougher antitrust enforcement leads to higher overcharge 

      Jensen, Sissel; Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E.; Sørgard, Lars (Discussion paper;05/13, Working paper, 2013-05)
      The economics of crime and punishment postulates that higher punishment leads to lower crime levels, or less severe crime. It is how- ever hard to get empirical support for this rather intuitive relationship. This paper ...

    • Endogenous verifiability in relational contracting 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper, Working paper, 2004-11)
      We analyze a repeated principal-agent trust game where the principal makes a specific investment by paying the agent up-front, expecting an agreed upon quality level in return. The verifiability of the agent’s action is ...

    • Incentive provision when contracting is costly 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper, Working paper, 2010-08)
      We analyze optimal incentive contracts in a model where the probability of court enforcement is determined by the costs spent on contracting. We show that contract costs matter for incentive provision, both in static spot ...

    • Relational incentive contracts for teams of multitasking agents 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper;10/23, Working paper, 2023-06-30)
      We analyze optimal relational contracts for a group (team) of multitasking agents with hidden actions. Contracts are based on noisy signals that may be correlated across agents and between tasks. The optimal contract defines ...

    • Relative performance evaluation, agent hold-up and firm organization 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper, Working paper, 2007-07)
      We analyze a situation where common noise makes compensation based on relative performance evaluation (RPE) desirable, but where the agents' ability to hold-up values ex post obstruct the implementation of optimal RPE ...

    • The rise of individual performance pay 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper, Working paper, 2006-07)
      Why does individual performance pay seem to prevail in human-capital-intensive industries where teamwork is so common? We present a model that aims to explain this. In a repeated game model of relational contracting, we ...

    • Team incentives in relational employment contracts 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper, Working paper, 2005-08)
      The paper analyzes conditions for implementing incentive schemes based on, respectively joint, relative and independent performance, in a relational contract between a principal and a team of two agents. A main result is ...

    • Teams and Tournaments in Relational Contracts 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper;13/13, Working paper, 2013-12)
      This paper analyses and compares optimal relational contracts be- tween a principal/firm and a set of agents when (a) only aggregate out- put can be observed, and (b) individual outputs can be observed. We show that the ...

    • Teams in Relational Contracts 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper;23/16, Working paper, 2016-12-16)
      We analyze relational contracting between a principal and a team of agents where only aggregate output is observable. We deduce optimal team incentive contracts under di¤erent set of assumptions, and show that the principal ...

    • The tenuous relationship between effort and performance pay 

      Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper;2012:8, Working paper, 2012-06)
      When a worker is offered performance related pay, the incentive effect is not only determined by the shape of the incentive contract, but also by the probability of contract enforcement. We show that weaker enforcement ...

    • Tournaments with prize-setting agents 

      Eriksen, Kristoffer W.; Kvaløy, Ola; Olsen, Trond E. (Discussion paper, Working paper, 2008-10)
      In many tournaments it is the contestants themselves who determine reward allocation. Labor-union members bargain over wage distribution, and many firms allow self-managed teams to freely determine internal resource ...