Caring about sunk costs: A behavioral solution to holdup problems with small stakes

被引:28
作者
Carmichael, L [1 ]
MacLeod, WB
机构
[1] Queens Univ, Kingston, ON K7L 3N6, Canada
[2] Univ So Calif, Los Angeles, CA 90089 USA
基金
美国国家科学基金会;
关键词
D O I
10.1093/jleo/19.1.106
中图分类号
F [经济];
学科分类号
02 ;
摘要
Economics students need to be taught that opportunity costs are important for optimal decision making but that sunk costs are not. Why should this be? Presumably these students have been making optimal decisions all their lives, and the concepts should be easy for them. We show that caring about sunk costs can help agents achieve efficient investments in a simple team production environment, Furthermore, the solution we propose is uniquely efficient if the environment is sufficiently complex. Hence, in addition to explaining contract form and ownership (Williamson, 1975; Hart, 1995), studies of the holdup problem may also provide insights into observed behavior in day-to-day bilateral bargaining problems.
引用
收藏
页码:106 / 118
页数:13
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