Anatomy of a Contract Change

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Jayaraman, Rajshri; Ray, Debraj; de Vericourt, Francis
• 署名单位: European School of Management & Technology; New York University; University of Warwick
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0002-8282
• DOI: 10.1257/aer.20141122
• 发表日期: 2016
• 页码: 316-358
• 关键词: incentive contracts; labor-market; field; workers; wages; gift; CHOICE; pay

摘要

We study a contract change for tea pluckers on an Indian plantation, with a higher government-stipulated baseline wage. Incentive piece rates were lowered or kept unchanged. Yet, in the following month, output increased by 20 to 80 percent. This response contradicts the standard model and several variants, is only partly explicable by greater supervision, and appears to be behavioral. But in subsequent months, the increase is comprehensively reversed. Though not an unequivocal indictment of behavioral models, these findings suggest that nonstandard responses may be ephemeral, and should ideally be tracked over an extended period of time.