Intrinsic Motivation and Incentives
Intrinsic Motivation and Incentives
复制标题
DOI：
10.1257/aer.98.2.201
复制
发表时间：
2008-04
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
Canice Prendergast
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Canice Prendergast
工人的行为是为了他们的雇主的利益？有很多原因。有时候金钱是动机，但通常是因为他们关心他们所做的事情。尽管这种内在动机的重要性，经济文学？真正提供了很少的理解相关的权衡调整时，固有的偏好（而不是金钱利益）是什么动机people. 1相反，文献主要集中在效率的提高，所产生的代理人分享他们的雇主的偏好。2本文提供了这样一个理论的内在动机，企业部分解决代理问题，通过雇用代理人与特定的人。更大偏好。与以前的文献不同，我表明，公司，一般来说，聘请代理人谁不分享他们的利益？相反，代理商不成比例地有动机进行潜艇？公司所关心的事情。具体来说，我表明，该机构雇用代理人与自己相似的偏好，只有在限制？在代理人的偏好不相关的情况下？埃文特？相反，机构的最佳反应是雇用有偏见的代理人，随着承包手段的增加，偏见的程度增加。情况会变得更糟。原因很简单？公司内部的工作是专业化的。例如，有些人制造东西，有些人设计，还有一些人销售，等等。同样，aca？教授们做研究，院长们筹集资金，行政人员？虽然做的书，社会工作者提供服务的客户，而他们的上级负责成本控制等，本文的主要新奇是如何显示招聘的做法？特别是内在动机被雇佣的人？在一个任务被专门化的世界里，随着合同的能力而变化。在这样做的过程中，它描绘了一幅企业通过雇佣具有极端利益的代理人来应对不可契约性的画面，代价是他们忽视了工作的其他方面。因此，例如，如果社会工作者的产出无法衡量，自然的反应将是雇用那些高度积极地为客户谋取利益的代理人，代价是他们忽视了成本控制等问题。虽然这个观察很简单，但它说明了使用内在动机的成本。什么事？也就是说，那些越来越只关心工作的一个方面的人的内生雇用。通过这种方式，这里概述的简单模型奠定了一种观点的基础，即“不良承包”公司是封地，那里居住着那些具有极端竞争利益的公司，我在其他地方详细阐述了这一点（Prendergast 2008）。对于内在动机理论的使用？实际上，公司必须对它有一定的控制权。这里的核心假设是，公司有一定的能力根据这些内在因素雇佣员工？Sic偏好我建立了一个机构的模型，它进行两种活动？比如说，专业服务？愿景和成本控制。它雇用了两名代理人来做这件事。这些任务有些专业化，其中一个代理主要（但不是唯一）提供服务，另一个代理主要进行成本控制。机构有目标吗？一个权衡这两个组成部分，并有一个性能指标，可以奖励代理。公司也会选择雇佣谁。讨论者：罗伯特·吉本斯，马萨诸塞州理工学院。
Workers act in the interests of their employ? ers for a host of reasons. Sometimes money is the motivation, but often it is because they care about what they do. Despite the importance of such intrinsic motivation, the economic litera? ture has offered little in terms of understanding relevant trade-offs when alignment of inherent preferences (rather than monetary interests) is what motivates people.1 Instead, the literature has focused largely on the efficiency gains that arise from agents sharing the preferences of their employers.2 This paper offers such a theory of intrinsic motivation, where firms partially solve agency problems by hiring agents with particu? lar preferences. Unlike the previous literature, I show that firms, in general, hire agents who do not share their interests?instead, agents are disproportionately motivated to carry out a sub? set of what the firm cares about. Specifically, I show that the institution hires the agent with similar preferences to himself only in the limit? ing case where the agent's preferences are irrel? evant?namely, when output can be perfectly contracted on. Instead, the optimal response of the institution is to hire biased agents, with the degree of bias increasing as contracting mea? sures get worse. The reason for this is rather simple?that jobs within firms are specialized. So, for example, some people make things, others design them, yet other sell them, and so on. Similarly, aca? demics do research, deans raise money, admin? istrators do the books, social workers provide services to clients while their superiors are charged with cost control, etc. The principal novelty of this paper is to show how hiring practices?and specifically the intrinsic moti? vation of those hired?changes as the ability to contract worsens in a world where tasks are specialized. In doing so, it paints a picture of firms responding to noncontractibility by hiring agents with very extreme interests, at the cost of their ignoring other aspects of their jobs. So, for example, if the output of a social worker cannot be measured, a natural response will be to hire agents who are highly motivated to get benefits to clients, at the cost of their ignoring things like cost control. Simple though this observation is, it illustrates a cost to using intrinsic motiva? tion?namely, the endogenous hiring of those who increasingly care only about one aspect of their job. In this way, the simple model outlined here lays the foundation for a view of "poor contracting" firms as fiefdoms, where those with extreme competing interests reside, a point I elaborate on elsewhere (Prendergast 2008). For a theory of intrinsic motivation to be use? ful, firms must have some control over it. The central assumption here is that firms have some ability to hire employees based on these intrin? sic preferences. I build a model of an institution that carries out two activities?say, service pro? vision and cost control. It employs two agents to do so. The tasks are somewhat specialized, in that one agent primarily (but not exclusively) does service provision and the other primarily does cost control. The institution has an objec? tive that trades off these two components and has a performance measure that can reward agents. The firm also chooses whom to hire. Potential * Discussant: Robert Gibbons, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.