Episode 41: Andrea Prat on the Allocation of Authority in Organizations

The paper discussed in this episode is “The Allocation of Authority in Organizations: A Field Experiment with Bureaucrats (academic.oup.com/qje/article/136/4/2195/6354797)”, by Oriana Bandiera (orianabandiera.net), Michael Carlos Best (blogs.cuit.columbia.edu/mcb2270), Adnan Qadir Khan (adnanqkhan.com), and Andrea Prat (columbia.edu/~ap3116/index.html), and which was published at the Quarterly Journal of Economics in 2021.
Other papers mentioned in this episode are:
Bandiera, O., Prat, A., & Valletti, T. (2009). Active and passive waste in government spending: evidence from a policy experiment. American Economic Review, 99(4), 1278-1308.
Liebman, J. B., & Mahoney, N. (2017). Do expiring budgets lead to wasteful year-end spending? Evidence from federal procurement. American Economic Review, 107(11), 3510-49.
NATIONAL AUDIT OFFICE. 2006. Assessing the value for money of OGC buying solutions. nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2006/12/0607103.…