多层科层中的最优序贯授权与“一刀切”政策

Optimal Sequential Delegation in a Hierarchical Structure and “Cut-off” Policy

沿袭Tirole(1986)的委托人-中间人-代理人科层结构,本文研究了当委托人不能直接管理代理人时的最优序贯授权问题。在该授权博弈中,委托人通过审慎设计中间人职权范围,影响其对代理人的授权行为,从而激励代理人更有效地提供和使用信息。我们发现,当下属之间利益偏差方向一致时,即中间人较委托人更愿意扩大代理人权限时,采用文献中常关注的"区间授权"(Holmstrom,1977)形式,委托人可以实现其直接向代理人授权时的最优结果。但是,如果下属间利益偏差方向相反,即中间人希望减小代理人权限时,"区间授权"将不再是最优。为了更好地影响控制中间人向代理人的次第授权行为,在最优序贯授权方案中委托人将移除部分中间选项。移除选项数目的多少取决于中间人的利益偏差程度。同授权与激励方面的文献不同,本文表明,即使在信息结构给定的条件下,移除中间项将作为科层中的控制工具,成为最优授权方案的一个特征。本文的发现从激励和授权角度对现行的一些法规执行实践中的"一刀切"政策(比如,"醉驾入刑"、大学招生录取等)提供了一些解释。

Following the hierarchical structure of principal-intermediary-agent in Tirole （1986）, this paper studies the optimal sequential delegation problem when a principal could not directly delegate to an informed agent. Therefore, a principal deliberately delegates to an intermediary with a menu of options to affect the downstream delegation behavior and to moti- vate the agent to undertake more efficient decision. We demonstrate that whenever the subor- dinates have like biases, i. e. , the intermediary wants to expand the agent＇s discretion, inter- val delegation as mentioned in Holmstrom （1977） could implement the second-best outcome. However, interval delegation is no longer optimal if the subordinates have opposing biases, i. e. , the intermediary prefers to shrink the agent＇s discretion. In the optimal delegation mecha- nism, the principal precludes some modest options from the delegation set, and the size of the removal depends on the bias of the intermediary. In contrast with previous literature, we show that even under an exogenous information structure, removing some modest actions ari- ses as a control device in hierarchy. This paper thus sheds new light on the widespread prac- tice of ＂cut-off＂ policy in the law enforcement in China, such as the anti-drunk-driving law, college admission policy, etc.