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The scalability of a marketplace depends on the operations of the marketplace platform and its sellers’ capacities. In this study, we explore one strategy that a marketplace platform can use to enhance its scalability: providing an ancillary service to sellers. In our model, a platform can choose whether and when to provide this service to sellers and, if so, what prices to charge and which types of sellers to serve. Although such a service helps small sellers, we highlight that the provision of such a service can diminish the incentives of large sellers to make their own investment, thereby reducing their potential output. When the output reduction by large sellers is substantial, the platform may not want to provide the ancillary service, and, even if it does, it may choose to set a price higher than its marginal cost to motivate large sellers to scale. The platform may also choose to strategically delay the provision of the service.

We present a novel explanation of why organizations tend to lose their agility over time despite their efforts to foster worker initiative in adapting to local information. Worker initiative ensures efficiency but requires strong incentives. When incentives are relational and the firm faces shocks to its credibility, it may adopt standardized work processes that ignore local information but yield satisfactory (though suboptimal) performance. The adoption of such standardized processes helps the firm survive the current shock but inflicts inefficiencies in the future. Although the firm may recover, it becomes more vulnerable to future shocks, and consequently, more reliant on the standardized work procedures.

We develop a theory of blockchain governance. In our model, the proof-of-work system, the most common set of rules for validating transactions in blockchains, creates an industrial ecosystem with specialized suppliers of goods and services. We analyze the interactions between blockchain governance and the market structure of the industries in the blockchain ecosystem. We show that the proof-of-work system may lead to a situation in which some large firms in the blockchain industrial ecosystem—blockchain conglomerates—capture the governance of the blockchain.

無論是投資者或是經營者，都希望自己參與的企業在市場競爭中立於不敗之地。一間公司的內在價值，取決於其維持自由現金流的能力。能做到歷久不衰、長期獲利的企業，通常都具備可持續競爭優勢（sustainable competitive advantage），也就是畢非德（Warren Buffett）口中的「經濟護城河」（economic moat）。

無論是投資者或是經營者，都希望自己參與的企業在市場競爭中立於不敗之地。一間公司的內在價值，取決於其維持自由現金流的能力。能做到歷久不衰、長期獲利的企業，通常都具備可持續競爭優勢（sustainable competitive advantage），也就是畢非德（Warren Buffett）口中的「經濟護城河」（economic moat）。

We study the optimal contracting problem with subjective evaluation when the principal can ask the agent to revise his work. The possibility of revision benefits the principal by providing the option value of making another attempt at the work. However, it also introduces a new type of incentive problem for the principal: she may ask for revision even if it is inefficient to do so. This new incentive issue for the principal also affects the incentive of the agent: he may procrastinate his effort in anticipation of excessive revision. This results in a trilemma: The optimal contract cannot simultaneously provide for efficient revision, efficient effort, and minimal ex post surplus destruction. The optimal contract will of necessity contain at least one of the following problems: revision, the principal asks for excessive revision; procrastination, the agent shirks in the early stage; or punishment, excessive surplus destruction at low-quality final output.

今年哈佛大學的畢業典禮上，校長巴科（Lawrence Bacow）提到由於受疫情和供應鏈影響，校內摺椅短缺，要不是員工足智多謀，可能一半畢業生得坐在地上。巴科以椅子作為比喻，目的是向畢業生提出希望和挑戰。

今年哈佛大學的畢業典禮上，校長巴科（Lawrence Bacow）提到由於受疫情和供應鏈影響，校內摺椅短缺，要不是員工足智多謀，可能一半畢業生得坐在地上。巴科以椅子作為比喻，目的是向畢業生提出希望和挑戰。

This paper shows that debt undermines relational incentives and harms worker morale. We build a dynamic model of a manager who uses limited financial resources to simultaneously repay a creditor and motivate a worker. If the manager can divert or misuse revenue, then debt makes the manager less willing to follow through on promised rewards, leading to low worker effort. In profit-maximizing equilibria, the firm prioritizes repaying its debts, leading to gradual increases in effort and wages. These dynamics can persist even after debts have been fully repaid. Consistent with this analysis, we document that a firm’s financial leverage is negatively related to measures of employee morale, wages, and productivity.