Essays on the Holdup Problem and on the Value of Legal Advice

本计画将探讨动态环境中的滞留问题。 当经济行为主体进行特定投资时，例如工人获得公司特定的技能，或商业伙伴调整其产品线和流程以满足其伙伴的需求时，就会存在滞留问题。 进行这种投资的当事方往往有被其伙伴没收的风险，因为没有伙伴，这些投资就没有什么价值。 保护投资者免受套牢风险一直是各种组织和契约安排的重要理论基础，包括纵向一体化、资产所有权重组。 这些理论中的大多数都基于对投资的非常静态的假设，这通常是不现实的。 目前的项目重新审视滞留问题的模型，允许一个更现实的投资动态。到目前为止的研究表明，在许多看似合理的情况下，滞留问题不一定会导致效率低下，因此对将滞留问题作为合同和组织的基本原理的依赖提出了质疑。在其他情况下，低效率将导致滞留问题，但组织的反应，以减轻低效率明显不同于现有理论所规定的。 因此，该项目将调查对效率低下的组织/合同处理办法，并将在此过程中探讨对资产所有权在公司业绩中的作用、排他性协议和其他贸易合同在保护具体投资方面的作用以及保护应享权利和补偿违反权利的最佳法律的规则（即，责任规则与财产规则的问题）。

This project will investigate the implication of the holdup problem in a dynamic environment. The holdup problem exists when an economic agent makes specific investments, such as workers' acquiring firm-specific skills, or business partners adapting their product lines and processes to the needs of their partners. Parties making such investments are often at the risk of expropriation by their partners since these investments are worth little without their partners. Protecting the investors from the risk of holdup has been a prominent rationale for various organization and contractual arrangements, including vertical integration, reorganization of asset ownership. Most of these theories rest on a very static assumption about the investments, which is often unrealistic. The current project reexamines the holdup problem with a model that permits a more realistic investment dynamics. The research so far reveals that, in many plausible circumstances, the holdup problem need not entail inefficiencies, thus calling into question the reliance on the holdup problem as a rationale for contracts and organizations. In other cases, inefficiencies would result from the holdup problem, but organizational responses necessary to alleviate inefficiencies differ markedly from those prescribed by the existing theories. The project will thus investigate organizational/contractual treatment of inefficiencies, and will in the process explore implications on such long-standing issues as the role of asset ownership in the performance of firms, the effect of exclusivity agreements and other trade contracts in protecting specific investments, and the optimal legal rule for protecting entitlements and compensating their breach (i.e., the issue of the liability rule vs. the property rule).