Paper Type

Short

Paper Number

1709

Description

Remote work is increasingly becoming a significant part of the economy, converting the work dynamic between employers and employees into more of an agency relationship. In addition, the gig economy, also increasing and becoming more geographically diverse, is putting additional pressure on agency relationships through moral hazard. This is due to information asymmetry whereby the agent has an incentive to delegate work through sub-contracts without the principal's knowledge. We examine the issue of double-spending of time in common agency situations, whereby the agent submits invoices to multiple and unrelated principals for the same time period (contract cheating). This introduces risks of IP loss and sub-optimal solutions for the principals. We enhance the common agent model to include the time domain and describe conditions under which contract cheating can occur or improve the Nash equilibrium. We then propose a blockchain-based algorithmic solution to address this problem.

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Jul 2nd, 12:00 AM

Preventing Double Spending of Time in Remote Agency Work

Remote work is increasingly becoming a significant part of the economy, converting the work dynamic between employers and employees into more of an agency relationship. In addition, the gig economy, also increasing and becoming more geographically diverse, is putting additional pressure on agency relationships through moral hazard. This is due to information asymmetry whereby the agent has an incentive to delegate work through sub-contracts without the principal's knowledge. We examine the issue of double-spending of time in common agency situations, whereby the agent submits invoices to multiple and unrelated principals for the same time period (contract cheating). This introduces risks of IP loss and sub-optimal solutions for the principals. We enhance the common agent model to include the time domain and describe conditions under which contract cheating can occur or improve the Nash equilibrium. We then propose a blockchain-based algorithmic solution to address this problem.

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