Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Human capital theory distinguishes between training in general-usage and firm-specific skills. Terms of use: Documents inIn his seminal work, Becker (1964) argues that employers will not be willing to invest in general training when labor markets are competitive. However, they are willing to invest in specific training because it cannot be transferred to outside firms. The paper reconsiders Becker's theory. We show that there exists an incentive complementarity between employersponsored general and specific investments: the possibility to provide specific training leads the employer to invest in general human capital. Conversely, the latter reduces the hold-up problem that arises with respect to the provision of firm-specific training. We also consider the virtues of long-term contracting and discuss some empirical observations that could be explained by the model. JEL Classification: C78, L14, L15, D82.

The paper examines the consequences of the economic integration of factor markets in a model with two countries that redistribute income among their residents. The social benefits in each country are financed by a source based tax on capital which is democratically chosen by its inhabitants. If either capital or labour is internationally mobile, the countries engage in fiscal competition and the partial integration of capital or labour markets is detrimental to the countries' redistributive ability. A move from partial to full integration, however, may alleviate rather than intensify fiscal competition, particularly, if the two countries face sufficiently similar economic and political conditions. In such a situation, for example, tax competition for mobile capital is softened as the labour market becomes more integrated and even vanishes if both factors are fully mobile. As a result, there is more redistribution in equilibrium and a majority of the population * This paper has benefitted from comments by Jan Brueckner, Ig Horstmann, Dave Wildasin, and various participants of seminars at Bonn, Heidelberg, Konstanz, Mannheim, the

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Abstract. The paper studies an adverse selection model in which a contractible, but imperfect signal on the agent's type becomes available ex post. The agent is protected by limited liability which we model as an upper bound on total payments made to the principal. The maximum punishment level is then endogenous, and the following conclusions emerge. First, the qualitative effects of the signal can be unambiguously tied to the nature of the underlying problem (e.g., whether the agent is in a 'buyer' or a 'seller' position). Second, the joint surplus of the relationship may well fall, i.e., the distortions due to informational asymmetries can become more pronounced although more information is now available. Finally, the agent may benefit from releasing additional signals because of an associated increase in expected informational rents. JEL Classification: D82