Fuller details to be advised.

Title:On the Informed Principal Model with Common Values

Abstract: This paper reconsiders the informed principal model with common values. It provides conditions that allow for the characterisation of the set of equilibrium allocations of the game in which the principal makes a take-it-or-leave-it offer of a mechanism to the agent. In particular, it is shown that the Rothschild-Stiglitz-Wilson allocation (i.e., the allocation that is undominated for the principal within the set of allocations that are incentive compatible for the principal and type-by-type individually rational for the agent) and every allocation that dominates it and is individually rational for the agent relative to the prior beliefs (if such an allocation exists) constitutes an equilibrium allocation whenever the RSW allocation is interim optimal relative to some strictly positive beliefs. If the principal confines herself to offering direct revelation mechanisms, the RSW allocation and every allocation that dominates and is individually rational for the agent relative to the prior beliefs (if such an allocation exists) constitutes equilibrium allocations without imposing any condition. Sufficient conditions are presented such that the set of equilibrium allocations is fully characterised. The results are shown to be in contrast to those obtained in Maskin and Tirole (1992) and illustrated in several economic applications.

Title to be advised.

This workshop will be via Microsoft Teams

Speaker: Costas Cavounidis

Title: Education and Human Capital in General Equilibrium: Who does what - and why. (joint w/ Vittoria Dicandia, Kevin Lang, Raghav Malhotra).

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Raghav will be presenting: Variance Based tests of market demand

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Costas will present: Losing by Betting on Success (w/ Sambuddha Ghosh).

​Abstract: A principal incentivizes agents to exert effort, when only the success or failure of a joint project is observable. We construct a mechanism in which agents message the principal before exerting effort. The mechanism interprets messages as bets on the success of the project. We show that if full effort is uniquely implementable by some scheme, our mechanism can uniquely implement it using the equilibrium transfers from any Nash implementation. Hence, the result of high and unequal wages in Winter 2004 is reversed if the principal can solicit messages. This despite the fact that agents have no information to signal.

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Title - Bargaining with Moral Agents

Title - Rationality of Decisions That Avoid Predictably Regrettable Consequences (in working progress)

Abstract - A novel characterization of rationality is offered which relies on the hypothesis that under no predictable circumstances should behaviour in any finite decision tree ever lead to a consequence which, relative to the predicted feasible set F, belongs to a specified subset R(F) of regrettable consequences. The hypothesis is applied to behaviour that is defined on an unrestricted domain of finite decision trees, including continuation subtrees, with:

(i) decision nodes where the decision maker must make a move;

(ii) chance nodes at which a “roulette lottery” with exogenously specified strictly positive probabilities is resolved;

(iii) event nodes at which a “horse lottery” is resolved.

Building on earlier discussions of consequentialist behaviour, the hypothesis is shown to imply that behaviour must maximize a complete and transitive preference relation over consequence lotteries, with preferences that satisfy the independence axiom of expected utility theory, as well as a strict form of Anscombe and Aumann's extension of Savage's sure thing principle. Assuming continuity, non-trivial consequence domains, and a generalized form of state independence, the hypothesis is equivalent to a refined form of Bayesian rationality that excludes zero probabilities.

Nick Scholz presenting "A continuous time health mechanism without money ". The seminar will be online only via MS Teams.

MS Teams: Meeting scheduled in the Microeconomics Channel

Title: Lead Us Not Into Temptation: on the Dynamics of History Dependent Self-Control

Title: Contracting with Unconscious Biases

Abstract: A principal and an agent have non-common priors on uncertainty in optimal contracting with moral hazard. I introduce an outside observer's belief considered as accurate to conduct objective welfare analysis. Without incentive provision, the two players' biases exhibit asymmetric effects on welfare. An overconfident (underconfident) agent is better-off if the principal is more overconfident (underconfident) than him. However, a biased principal not only benefits if the agent is more biased than him in the same direction, but also could be better-off if the agent biases towards a different direction. With incentive provision, only the agent's bias affects welfare. It costs a biased principal less as long as the agent is overconfident, while only an underconfident agent benefits.

Title: Smart Contracts and the Coase Conjecture

Title to be advised.

Title: "Subcontracting Away Strategic Uncertainty" (with Costas Cavounidis)

MS Teams Link: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3a44e76bae944e45478914cb98497b7098%40thread.tacv2/1665048380873?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%2209bacfbd-47ef-4465-9265-3546f2eaf6bc%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%22aac8c148-e99c-4793-9a9e-9a8b8d83de0e%22%7dLink opens in a new window

Title: History-Dependent Self-Control and Emotional Decision-Making

MS Teams Link: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3a44e76bae944e45478914cb98497b7098%40thread.tacv2/1665048380873?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%2209bacfbd-47ef-4465-9265-3546f2eaf6bc%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%22aac8c148-e99c-4793-9a9e-9a8b8d83de0e%22%7d

Title: Dynamic Predation and Entry Deterrence.

Title: Signaling effect of information design

Title: Partition Dependent Expected Utility

Title: Quantum Observables as Kolmogorov Random Variables

Yating will present his paper titled 'Path-Dependent Equilibrium and Polarization in Public Responses to a Pandemic'.

Title is: Natural Language Equilibrium: Signaling Games

Abstract. We refine sequential equilibrium in signaling games by incorporating natural language in the form of meaningful cheap talk directly into the theory. Because meaning in any language can be usurped by equilibrium conventions to the contrary, the import of natural language in games must stem from how meaning is assigned to language used off the path of play. We find that a simple and intuitive convention about the players’ common understanding of language off-path has surprising power to refine sequential equilibrium in signaling games.

Title: If You’re NOT So Smart, Why Are You Rich? Robust Market Selection with General Recursive Preferences, with Jaden Yang Chen (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA)

Title: Smart Banks (with Maxi Guennewig and Yuliyan Mitkov)

Title to be advised.

Title to be advised.

Title: Community Enforcement with Endogenous Records

Abstract: I study repeated games with anonymous random matching where players can erase signals from their records. When players are sufficiently long-lived and have strictly dominant actions, they will play their dominant actions with probability close to one in all equilibria. When players' expected lifespans are intermediate, there exist purifiable equilibria with a positive level of cooperation in the submodular prisoner's dilemma but not in the supermodular prisoner's dilemma. Therefore, the maximal level of cooperation a community can sustain is not monotone with respect to players' expected lifespans and the complementarity in players' actions can undermine their abilities to sustain cooperation.

Title: Selling data with private information source

Title to be advised.