An Empirical Examination of Moral Hazard in the Vehicle Inspection Market
利用加州车辆排放检测的交易数据，研究检测员是否因激励而帮助车辆通过检测，以及不同企业的组织特征如何影响检测员行为，发现消费者能提供通过检测的激励，且企业间差异符合代理理论。
Moral hazard arises in diagnosis-cure markets such as auto repair and health care when sellers have an incentive to misrepresent a buyer's condition in order to increase demand for the treatments they supply. This article examines the market for California vehicle emission inspections. Using transaction-level data, I investigate whether the market provides incentives that lead inspectors to help vehicles pass and how the behavior of inspectors varies with their firm's organizational characteristics. I find that consumers are generally able to provide firms and inspectors incentives to help them pass, and I find cross-firm differences that are consistent with agency theory.