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This paper aims to investigate, through the lens of the principal–agent problem, the relationship between payment of National Hockey League (NHL) salaries and player performance during the period of 2005-2011 and explore the inherent issues within the NHL player compensation and incentive structure.

The research adopts a pragmatic philosophy with deductive reasoning. This paper focuses on the NHL season 2005-2011 and undertake analysis of historical player contracts and performance data of 670 players across 29 clubs to undertake liner regression analysis.

This paper quantifies potential inefficiencies of NHL league contracts and defines the parameters of the principal–agent problem. It is identifies that player performance generally increases with salary, is higher in the first year of a contract and despite decreasing over the life of the contract, will usually peak again in the final year of the contract.

The research is based around figures from 2005-2011 and secondary statistical data. The study captures quantitative data but does not allow for an exploration of the qualitative perspective to the problem.

Entry-level or first contracts are good for all teams and players because they provide incentive to perform and a reduction of risk to the team should a player not perform to expectations. The same can be said for players at the other end of the spectrum. Although not typically used much, performance bonuses for players over the age of 35 allow clubs to “take a chance” on a player and the player can benefit by reaching attainable bonuses. These findings therefore provide contributions to the practicing managers and coaches of NHL teams who can consider the results to help shape their approach to management of players and the planning of teams and succession planning for talent.

The paper presents a comprehensive and current perspective of the principal–agent problem in NHL and extends the work of Purcell (2009) and Gannon (2009) in understanding player performance enhancement.

The purpose of this study is to analyze year-end spending practices in the European Economic Area (EEA) to baseline the pervasiveness of year-end spending spikes across countries in Europe.

The Tenders Electronic Daily dataset is used to descriptively analyze above-threshold procurement contracts by country, year and contract type from 2009 to 2018. Proportional distributions are employed to compare percentages of spend across quarters. Analyses are run within each country on the number of years displaying a fourth quarter spike, as well as within each country and contract type.

The results show that while spending spikes for above-threshold contracts in the final fiscal quarter are not consistent across all countries, patterns emerge when the data are disaggregated by country. The most populous nations in the EEA are more likely to have years with the highest proportion of fiscal spend occurring in the fourth quarter. Further, the type of contract makes a difference – services and supplies contracts are more likely to display fourth quarter spikes than works contracts.

This article provides the first analysis of the year-end spending spike across countries in Europe using procurement data, as well as the first to disaggregate by year and contract type. Findings support the literature on the presence of year-end spikes; such spikes exist even for above-threshold public procurement contracts.

The relationship between airports and airlines is very interesting from an economics perspective, and analysis of this relationship is wide open for new research endeavors. For instance, airport and airline interactions can be viewed as a zero-sum game of deciding, say, airport landing charges, while at the same time both entities have an incentive making a joint effort to enhance their ability to generate passenger demand and to contribute to growing regional economies. Within this theoretical framework, their relationship consists of not only a binary choice of conflict or cooperation, but also suggests the possibility of complex mixtures of conflict and cooperation. While understanding the interdependence of airports and airlines is an important issue in transportation economics, research examining the complexity of airport and airline relationships is relatively new to the field. This chapter contributes to this research area, in part, by introducing one very interesting example of an airport and airline relationship that considers an element of conflict and cooperation. Specifically, this chapter examines the economic consequences of a risk sharing contract. Analysis of the risk sharing contract recognizes the relevance of microeconomic theories, such as contract theory and principal–agent theory and reveals how these concepts can be applied to traditional transport economics. Predictions of risk sharing between airlines and airports using these theories are derived using numerical examples. Findings reveal that the risk-sharing agreement based on the Noto Airport Load Factor Guarantee Mechanism (LFGM) contract enables the airport side and the airline side not only to share the monetary consequences of demand fluctuation, but also to secure air flights from a local airport to Tokyo, to jointly enhance their various demand-inducing efforts, and to increase their utilities in order to meet the common target they set in the contract. With the LFGM contract, both sides have consistently maintained the air transport network in a relatively low demand area for more than 10 years without significant outside financial assistance. The findings from this chapter also contribute to better understanding the complex relationships among aviation entities, to the recognition of importance and potential to design properly the airport and airline contract, and to the advancement of economic and public policy analysis of this sector.

Federal agencies can directly purchase more than 8 million commercial products and services through the General Services Administration’s (GSA) multiple award schedules (MAS) contracts. Over the past 10 years, MAS contract sales have increased dramatically--with sales jumping from $4 billion to $32 billion. In addition to simplifying the procurement process, the MAS program is designed to take advantage of the government’s significant aggregate buying power. While GSA seeks to negotiate best pricing for its MAS contracts by analyzing vendor-provided information--such as discounts given to other customers and recent sales data for the same or similar items--past reports have found that GSA has not always used pricing tools effectively and that management controls for better ensuring fair and reasonable pricing had been reduced. This report discusses GSA’s process for negotiating most favored customer prices for MAS contracts and its efforts to improve the overall quality of negotiations. Contract negotiators at the four MAS acquisition centers that GAO reviewed use a variety of tools for obtaining most favored customer pricing--that is, the prices vendors offer their best customers. However, the GAO analysis of GSA’s review of selected fiscal year 2004 MAS contract files found that nearly 60 percent lacked the documentation needed to establish clearly that the prices were effectively negotiated. Specifically, the contract documentation did not establish that negotiated prices were based on accurate, complete, and current vendor information; adequate price analyses; and reasonable price negotiations. GSA’s efforts to ensure most favored customer pricing have been hindered by the significant decline in the use of pre-award and postaward audits of pre-award pricing information, two independent pricing tools that have helped GSA avoid or recover hundreds of millions of dollars in excessive pricing. In fiscal year 1995, GSA conducted 154 pre-award audits; by 2004 the number of pre-award audits fell to 40. Postaward audits--which resulted in an average annual recovery of $18 million in the early 1990s--were discontinued in 1997 when GSA revised its MAS contract audit policies to increase the use of pre-award audits--an increase that has not materialized. In March 2003, GSA established the Acquisition Quality Measurement and Improvement Program, initiating the use of prenegotiation panels and postaward quality reviews of contracts. However, the effectiveness of these initiatives has been limited due to insufficient oversight. For example, three of the MAS acquisition centers that GAO visited had not reported the results of their 2003 prenegotiation panels--information needed by management to identify problems and make needed improvements. Moreover, the fourth acquisition center--which accounted for about 56 percent of the fiscal year 2004 MAS sales--has yet to hold a panel. While the postaward quality reviews--the second program initiative--have identified deficiencies in contract file documentation, they did not determine the underlying causes of these deficiencies or prescribe actions needed to address them. As a result of these weaknesses, GSA cannot be assured that fair and reasonable prices have been negotiated for its MAS contracts.

Describes the tenure and contract experience of approximately 300 UK chief executive officers (CEOs) in 1993. Draws on the results of a retrospective postal questionnaire and examines whether the recommendations of the Cadbury report regarding contract provision of senior executives are being adhered to. The results of this descriptive exercise show that the median contract length of a typical UK CEO in a large company is three years. This is in line with the recommendations made by the Cadbury report. We find that on average such CEOs have been with their company for about five and a half years. Argues that, as a matter of good policy, companies should reveal the reasons for the length of the contract received by the CEO if this exceeds 12 months.

In the previous monograph, a discussion took place on what constitutes dismissal and when the termination of the contract of employment takes effect. These two aspects treat the first of the statutory qualifications necessary to enable the employee to exercise his right not to be unfairly dismissed, namely that he must first be dismissed.

While much of the literature testing for shirking by professional athletes have used performance metrics, some works have quantified shirking in dollar terms by comparing salary to estimated marginal revenue product (MRP). However, Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) approaches to measuring shirking by comparing salary to MRP have an endogeneity problem, as salary and contract length are determined simultaneously. We test for shirking in Major League Baseball (MLB) using an MRP approach, addressing this potential endogeneity.

This paper uses instrumental variables regression to address potential endogeneity using MLB season-level player and team data from 2010 to 2017.

Using OLS regression, the impact of an additional year of guaranteed contract on shirking is estimated at approximately $1m in 2010 US dollars, and the impact of having a long-term contract is estimated at $5m, estimates comparable to those in the literature. Using instrumental variables regression, these impacts increase to $1.6m and over $9m in 2010 dollars.

Given large, causal shirking estimates, profit maximizing sports organizations should take caution when negotiating long-term contracts. These findings also have important implications for other labor market settings where workers feel job security.

To our knowledge, this is the first work testing for shirking in sports using an MRP approach which uses instrumental variables regression to address potential endogeneity.

This article is based on responses to the 1982 general invitation from the Review Board for Government Contracts. The authors' main contention is that the pricing of government contracts has hitherto been deficient in at least two fundamental respects — the use of the historic cost accounting model as a computational framework for the costing and pricing of non‐competitive Government contracts and the use of ex post accounting rates of return for estimating target rates of return.

Distribution has been a major element of retailers′ marketing strategy in recent years as companies strive to control costs but at the same time seek competitive advantage through improving service to stores and gaining greater control of stock in the supply chain. In an interview survey of distribution directors from major multiple groups, all companies were reviewing their distribution strategy and many had made major changes to their distribution system. Centralisation of stock in strategically located RDCs and the use of third party contractors were main features of retail companies′ strategy. Contractors were much more aggressive in marketing their services to retailers than hitherto. This is partly related to the competitive and turbulent nature of the industry. In a survey of marketing directors/managers of distribution companies, it was clear that firms were trying to raise their profile in the market as they “went public” and/or because they were moving into new industry sectors away from their “core” specialist areas.

One of the main challenges facing construction contractors is incorporating future unknown contracts into their annual financial budgets. This paper sets out to review current academic work in this area and to argue that computer‐based simulation techniques are too complex to be adopted in the industry. Therefore, an alternative and a mathematically‐based technique needs to be developed and evaluated.

The paper proposes that, as the pattern of winning construction contracts lacks any seasonality, it may be possible to assume all future work to be starting at one point in time and, by using an average standard value build‐up curve, average duration and the total value work needed, contractors will be able to estimate the total value of contracts needed to achieve a target turnover. Based on the total value of contracts to be won, a proposed mathematical equation is then used to assess the levels of working capital requirements.

The paper evaluates the proposed mathematical model through a series of hypothetical scenarios (developed using a detailed and tested computer‐based simulation model). Results demonstrated the validity and reliability of the models.

The working capital element of the proposed model applies to construction projects where traditional payment mechanisms have been applied (interim payments based on measurements).

The model is very practical in nature and will allow construction companies (particularly large ones) to assess the level of work (in terms of number and values of contracts) they will need to win for them to meet targets for turnover. The model also allows contractors to assess the associated level of funding required.

The mathematical model developed allows contractors to incorporate into their budgets future unknown contracts without the need for computer simulation.