Konferenzbeitrag
Betrayal Aversion and the Effectiveness of Incentive Contracts
In this paper we study the impact of betrayal aversion on agents' effort provision, when principals have discretion regarding agents' remuneration. We show theoretically that agents who work under a nonbinding bonus contract face a trade off in their effort choice between the likelihood and the level of betrayal. Thus, depending on which effect predominates, betrayal aversion may either undermine or underpin the effectiveness of bonus contracts to induce effort. The data of our experiment reveal a strong detrimental effect of betrayal aversion. If the principal promises to pay a bonus for sufficiently high effort, the message is ineffective when agents are characterized by a high degree of betrayal aversion. In strong contrast, employees with a low degree of betrayal aversion increase their performance by more than 50%, if they received this message. The findings in this article identify an additional hidden cost of economic incentives.
- Sprache
-
Englisch
- Erschienen in
-
Series: Beiträge zur Jahrestagung des Vereins für Socialpolitik 2018: Digitale Wirtschaft - Session: Experiments - Incentives ; No. C19-V3
- Klassifikation
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Wirtschaft
Design of Experiments: Laboratory, Individual
Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
- Thema
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Betrayal Aversion
Principal Agent Problem
Experiment
- Ereignis
-
Geistige Schöpfung
- (wer)
-
Rau, Holger
Müller, Stephan
- Ereignis
-
Veröffentlichung
- (wer)
-
ZBW - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft
- (wo)
-
Kiel, Hamburg
- (wann)
-
2018
- Handle
- Letzte Aktualisierung
-
10.03.2025, 11:42 MEZ
Datenpartner
ZBW - Deutsche Zentralbibliothek für Wirtschaftswissenschaften - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft. Bei Fragen zum Objekt wenden Sie sich bitte an den Datenpartner.
Objekttyp
- Konferenzbeitrag
Beteiligte
- Rau, Holger
- Müller, Stephan
- ZBW - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft
Entstanden
- 2018