University of Nottingham, UK
IZA World of Labor role
Author
Current position
Associate Professor in Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham, UK
Research interest
Behavioral and experimental economics, social norm compliance, and the study of positive and negative incentives
Qualifications
PhD Economics, University of Nottingham, 2010
Selected publications
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“Discretionary sanctions and rewards in the repeated inspection game.” Management Science (Forthcoming) (with T. Offerman, M. Sefton, and A. van der Veen).
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“Self-selection into laboratory experiments: Pro-social Motives versus Monetary Incentives.” Experimental Economics 18:2 (2015): 195–214 (with J. Abeler).
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“Encouraging compliance: Bonuses vs. fines in inspection games.” Journal of Law, Economics, & Organization 30:3 (2014): 623–648 (with T. Offerman, M. Sefton, and A. van der Veen).
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"Peer effects in pro-social behavior: Social norms or social preferences?" Journal of the European Economic Association 11:3 (2013): 548–573 (with S. Gächter and M. Sefton).
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“Sequential versus simultaneous contributions to public goods: Experimental evidence.” Journal of Public Economics 94:7–8 (2010): 515–522 (with S. Gächter, E. Renner, and M. Sefton).
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Employee incentives: Bonuses or penalties?
Penalty contracts lead to higher productivity than performance-based bonuses, but at the cost of employer/staff relations
Daniele Nosenzo, January 2016Firms regularly use incentives to motivate their employees to be more productive. However, often little attention is paid to the language used in employment contracts to describe these incentives. It may be more effective to present incentives as entitlements that can be lost by failing to reach a performance target, rather than as additional rewards that can be gained by reaching that target. However, emphasizing the potential losses incurred as a result of failure may entail hidden costs for the employer, as it may damage the trust relationship between a firm and its employees.MoreLess