The Principal-Agent Problem: I Am the Principal, the Agent, and the Problem

    My house of nine(!) people has begun to deal with the problems of shirking. All of us usually expect somebody else in the house to do the chores, which means none of the chores really get done. In contrast with the traditional (and highly time-consuming) methods of making a chore chart or having a house discussion about chore delegation, we simply get to the point where a house member can't bear the house being in shambles, so they text the group chat or members individually and delegate tasks that need to be done. 

    With this strategy, a task not being done can be blamed on an individual member, not the collective. This also leads to any one member of the house being a principal, agent, or both at any given time. The power structure is indiscernible in the house, with every member being under the will and in control of every other member. As a result of this, there is plenty of room for slack. No member owes anything to any other member so we can all misbehave, or shirk, without any real consequence. However, the social norm in place is to not redistribute tasks unless somebody offers to take the task from you because they desperately want it to be done. Whoever holds out longest, or cares the least, about any given task ends up doing the least amount of chores. 

    The industrial organization of our house does not have clear authority or any clear structure at all which leads to a lot of slack (me being a strong slacker myself). My public choice solution? Appoint a house representative unanimously to divvy up all the tasks however they wish with a month long term, with voting on the last day of every month for a new representative (or the same one if they do their job well). If someone doesn't do their task by the end of the month, they are disqualified from getting the position the next month. Sure, there might have to be stipulations to stop the representative from giving all the work to one person, among other issues, but I've run out of room to write about it so I'll just leave it to readers to work out the kinks.