But, tenants may open windows rather than turn down the heating. He asks tenants to take care of the property and minimise electricity bills. The landlord owns house and rents out to tenants. Instead, they concentrate on enjoying work and getting on with workers. However, the manager and workers, who are responsible for day to day running of the firm, may fail to pursue profit maximisation. Shareholders will wish to maximise a firm’s profits to increase their dividends. Asymmetric information (the agent having more information than principle.) The shareholder can see some stats like profit, but only the manager knows exactly how hard he worked or didn’t.
Also, in this situation, the manager does not share the same interest in maximising profits as the owner. However, due to agency costs, the shareholder cannot fully know how hard the agent is working and to what extent the manager is fulfilling the contract. He hires a manager (agent) to run the business. Secondly, the interests of the principal diverge from that of the agent, meaning that the outcome is less desirable than the principal expects.įor example, a shareholder (principal) wants to maximise profits for his firm.
AGENT PRINCIPAL DEFINITION FULL
The principal-agent problem occurs when a principal delegates an action to another individual (agent), but the principal does not have full information about how the agent will behave.