Complexity and renegotiation: A foundation for incomplete contracts

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Segal, I
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Berkeley
• 刊物名称: REVIEW OF ECONOMIC STUDIES
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0034-6527
• DOI: 10.1111/1467-937X.00078
• 发表日期: 1999
• 页码: 57-82
• 关键词: hold-up problem; long-term; INVESTMENT

摘要

The paper considers a hold-up model where only one of n future trading opportunities will prove to be efficient, and where ex post renegotiation of the ex ante contract cannot be prevented. As the environment becomes more complex (n --> infinity), the outcome under any message-contingent long-term contract converges to that of the incomplete contracting model where trade is contractible ex post, but not ex ante. When trades are costly to describe, both ex ante and ex post, the incomplete contracting result is extended to a broader class of environments.