Contractual Form, Retail Price, and Asset Characteristics in Gasoline Retailing
利用马萨诸塞州东部加油站的微观数据，检验制造商与零售商关系中的委托代理分析预测，发现上游企业会根据下游努力的可观测性选择激励强度不同的合同，并影响零售价格。
Predictions from a principal-agent analysis of the manufacturer-retailer relationship are tested using microdata on contractual form, retail outlet characteristics, and retail prices for gasoline stations in eastern Massachusetts. The empirical results are consistent with upstream firms choosing contracts with strong incentives but less direct control when outlet characteristics make unobservable effort by downstream agents important. Manufacturers trade off incentive power for more direct control when observable effort is relatively more important. There is some evidence that the retail prices of some gasoline products are lower when the upstream firm is allowed to control the retail price directly.