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on Microeconomics |
| By: | Norde, Henk (CentER and Department of Econometrics and Operations Research, Tilburg University); Voorneveld, Mark (Dept. of Economics) |
| Abstract: | The rational choice paradigm in game theory and other fields of economics has agents best-responding to beliefs about factors that are outside their control. And making certain options a best response is a common problem in mechanism design and information elicitation. But not every correspondence can be made into a best-response correspondence. So what characterizes a feasible best-response correspondence? And once we know that, can we find some or even all utility functions that give rise to this best-response correspondence? We answer these three questions for an expected-utility maximizing agent with finitely many actions and probabilistic beliefs over finitely many states or opponents' strategies. We apply our results to information elicitation problems where contracts (scoring rules) are designed to financially reward an expected-payoff maximizing agent to truthfully reveal a property of her belief by sending a report from some finite set of messages. This leads to a number of new insights: firstly, we characterize exactly which properties can be elicited using scoring rules; secondly, we show that in this class of problems quadratic scoring rules are both necessary and sufficient methods of doing so. |
| Keywords: | best-response correspondence; best-response equivalence; information elicitation; scoring rule |
| JEL: | C72 D82 D83 |
| Date: | 2019–04–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:hastec:2019_002&r=all |
| By: | Carlos Segura-Rodriguez (Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania) |
| Abstract: | I study endogenous network formation in an environment in which individuals want to forecast a stochastic state and it is costly for them to communicate with others to exchange some exogenously observed information. Due to the existence of information complementarities, individuals’ preferences for networks in which they have multiple neighbors cannot be characterized by a linear ranking of the pairwise correlations between their signals. Instead, these complementarities generate a counterintuitive result: for a fixed number of individuals, information structures exist in which all signals are conditionally positively correlated, and these are preferred to a structure in which all signals are conditionally independent. Therefore, it may be that the only strongly stable network consists of two cliques with signals that are highly positively correlated within each clique that generate different beliefs across cliques, even when there are opportunities to exchange information with individuals sharing less correlated signals. Thus, this model exemplifies how homophily and belief polarization can coexist in a rational environment. |
| Keywords: | Information, Communication, Endogenous Networks, Homophily, Polarization |
| JEL: | C71 D83 D85 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pen:papers:19-007&r=all |
| By: | Egorov, Georgy; Sonin, Konstantin |
| Abstract: | We analyze persuasion in a model, in which each receiver (of many) might buy a direct access to the sender's signal or to rely on her network connections to get the same information. For the sender, a more biased signal increases the impact per subscriber (direct receiver), yet diminishes the willingness of agents to become subscribers. Contrary to the naive intuition, the optimal propaganda might target peripheral, rather than centrally located agents, and is at its maximum level when the probability that information flows between agents is either zero, or nearly one, but not in-between. The density of the network has a non-monotonic effect on the optimal level of propaganda as well. |
| Keywords: | Bayesian persuasion; networks; percolation; Propaganda |
| JEL: | D85 L82 |
| Date: | 2019–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:13723&r=all |
| By: | Paul Heidhues; Philipp Strack |
| Abstract: | Timing decisions are common: when to file your taxes, finish a referee report, or complete a task at work. We ask whether time preferences can be inferred when \textsl{only} task completion is observed. To answer this question, we analyze the following model: each period a decision maker faces the choice whether to complete the task today or to postpone it to later. Cost and benefits of task completion cannot be directly observed by the analyst, but the analyst knows that net benefits are drawn independently between periods from a time-invariant distribution and that the agent has time-separable utility. Furthermore, we suppose the analyst can observe the agent's exact stopping probability. We establish that for any agent with quasi-hyperbolic $\beta,\delta$-preferences and given level of partial naivete $\hat{\beta}$, the probability of completing the task conditional on not having done it earlier increases towards the deadline. And conversely, for any given preference parameters $\beta,\delta$ and (weakly increasing) profile of task completion probability, there exists a stationary payoff distribution that rationalizes her behavior as long as the agent is either sophisticated or fully naive. An immediate corollary being that, without parametric assumptions, it is impossible to rule out time-consistency even when imposing an a priori assumption on the permissible long-run discount factor. We also provide an exact partial identification result when the analyst can, in addition to the stopping probability, observe the agent's continuation value. |
| Date: | 2019–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:1905.03959&r=all |
| By: | Seres, Gyula (Tilburg University, TILEC) |
| Abstract: | This paper considers dynamic pricing strategies in a durable good monopoly model with uncertain commitment power to set price paths. The type of the monopolist is private information of the firm and not observable to consumers. If commitment to future prices is not possible, the initial price is high in equilibrium, but the firm falls prey to the Coase conjecture later to capture the residual demand. The relative price cut is increasing in the probability of commitment as buyers anticipate that a steady price is likely and purchase early. Pooling in prices may occur for perpetuity if commitment is suciently weak. Polling for innity is also preserved if committing to a high price is endogenously chosen by the firm. |
| Keywords: | monopoly; commitment; Information asymmetry |
| JEL: | D42 L12 D61 D82 |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tiu:tiutil:9d3c763b-0e8d-47c5-8b47-648cd9ac12e5&r=all |
| By: | Jeanne Hagenbach (Département d'économie); Frédéric Koessler (Ecole d'Économie de Paris - Paris School of Economics (PSE)) |
| Abstract: | This paper proposes an equilibrium concept, Language-Based Expectation Equilibrium, which accounts for partial language understanding in sender-receiver cheap talk games. Each player is endowed with a privately known language competence which represents all the messages that he understands. For the messages he does not understand, he has correct but only coarse expectations about the equilibrium strategies of the other player. In general, a language-based expectation equilibrium outcome differs from Nash and communication equilibrium outcomes, but is always a Bayesian solution. Partial language competence of the sender rationalizes information transmission and lies in pure persuasion problems, and facilitates information transmission from a moderately biased sender. |
| Keywords: | Analogy-based expectations; Bayesian solution; Bounded rationality, cheap talk; Language; Pure persuasion; Strategic information transmission |
| JEL: | C72 D82 |
| Date: | 2019–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/3b2230a4419v9ojcpu27tsdrtb&r=all |
| By: | Christophe Labreuche (UMP CNRS/THALES - Unité mixte de physique CNRS/Thalès - THALES - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Michel Grabisch (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, PSE - Paris School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | In many Multi-Criteria Decision problems, one can construct with the decision maker several reference levels on the attributes such that some decision strategies are conditional on the comparison with these reference levels. The classical models (such as the Choquet integral) cannot represent these preferences. We are then interested in two models. The first one is the Choquet with respect to a p-ary capacity combined with utility functions, where the p-ary capacity is obtained from the reference levels. The second one is a specialization of the Generalized-Additive Independence (GAI) model, which is discretized to fit with the presence of reference levels. These two models share common properties (monotonicity, continuity, properly weighted,.. .), but differ on the interpolation means (Lovász extension for the Choquet integral, and multi-linear extension for the GAI model). A drawback of the use of the Choquet integral with respect to a p-ary capacity is that it cannot satisfy decision strategies in each domain bounded by two successive reference levels that are completely independent of one another. We show that this is not the case with the GAI model. |
| Keywords: | Generalized Additive Independence,Multiple criteria analysis |
| Date: | 2018–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02043265&r=all |
| By: | Carlos Segura-Rodriguez (Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania) |
| Abstract: | I study how a monopolist data broker (seller), who wants to maximize profits, should present and sell consumer data to a firm (buyer). The buyer has an interest in forecasting a particular consumer characteristic, but the seller is uncertain about which characteristic the buyer wants to forecast and how much the buyer values information. I assume that the joint distribution of both the unknown characteristics and the data is elliptical. This information environment reduces to a multidimensional, multi-product mechanism design problem in which the buyer’s payoffs are nonlinear. Hence, I cannot use the common differential approach to solve for the optimal mechanism. I obtain two main results. First, I show that the seller should optimally offer statistics that are linear combinations of the data and independent noise. Second, by using a direct approach, I show that in the optimal mechanism the seller might want to offer a continuum of different statistics, and these statistics, without containing independent noise, are less correlated than they would be if the seller could perfectly price discriminate. Thus this distortion affects the mimicking type more than the mimicked type. |
| Keywords: | Information Design, Mechanism Design, Multidimensional Screening,Product Design, Elliptical Distribution |
| JEL: | D42 D82 D83 D86 |
| Date: | 2019–04–21 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pen:papers:19-006&r=all |
| By: | François Maublanc; Sébastien Rouillon |
| Abstract: | We study multiple-prize contests where the number of prizes to be awarded is a random variable. We determine the symmetric Nash equilibrium of the contest game. We analyze the equilibrium outcome from the perspective of a contest designer aiming at maximizing the aggregate contest expenditure. Assuming that the total value at stake is non-increasing in the number of prizes, we show that the aggregate contest expenditure decreases with the expectation on the number of prizes (first-order stochastic dominance), with the risk in the number of prizes (second-order stochastic dominance), and increases with the number of contestants. We give sufficient conditions such that the same holds under a general specification. Accordingly, a contest designer aiming at maximizing the aggregate contest expenditure should always award a single prize, reveal this information to the contestants and open the contest game to all potential participants. |
| Keywords: | Contest model · Rent-seeking · Multiple-prizes · Number uncertainty · Incomplete information |
| JEL: | C7 D4 D7 D8 |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:grt:wpegrt:2019-07&r=all |
| By: | Agnieszka Rusinowska (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, PSE - Paris School of Economics); Akylai Taalaibekova (CORE - Center of Operation Research and Econometrics [Louvain] - UCL - Université Catholique de Louvain, CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | We consider a model of competitive opinion formation in which three persuaders characterized by (possibly unequal) persuasion impacts try to influence opinions in a society of individuals embedded in a social network. Two of the persuaders have the extreme and opposite opinions, and the third one has the centrist opinion. Each persuader chooses one individual to target, i.e., he forms a link with the chosen individual in order to spread his own "point of view" in the society and to get the average long run opinion as close as possible to his own opinion. We examine the opinion convergence and consensus reaching in the society. We study the existence and characterization of pure strategy Nash equilibria in the game played by the persuaders with equal impacts. This characterization depends on influenceability and centrality (intermediacy) of the targets. We discuss the effect of the centrist persuader on the consensus and symmetric equilibria, compared to the framework with only two persuaders having the extreme opinions. When the persuasion impacts are unequal with one persuader having a sufficiently large impact, the game has only equilibria in mixed strategies. |
| Abstract: | Nous considérons un modèle de formation d'opinion compétitive dans lequel trois persuadeurs caractérisés par des impacts de persuasion (éventuellement inégaux) tentent d'influencer les opinions dans une société d'individus intégrés dans un réseau social. Deux des persuadeurs ont des opinions extrêmes et opposées, et le troisième a l'opinion centriste. Chaque persuadeur choisit un individu à cibler, c'est-à-dire qu'il forme un lien avec l'individu choisi pour diffuser son propre « point de vue » dans la société et obtenir l'opinion moyenne à long terme aussi proche que possible de sa propre opinion. Nous examinons l'existence et la caractérisation d'équilibres de Nash de pure stratégie dans le jeu joué par les persuadeurs avec des impacts égaux. Cette caractérisation dépend de l'influençabilité et de la centralité des cibles. Nous discutons l'effet du persuadeur centriste sur le consensus et les équilibres symétriques, comparé au cadre avec seulement deux persuadeurs ayant des opinions extrêmes. Lorsque les impacts de persuasion sont inégaux avec un persuadeur ayant un impact suffisamment important, le jeu n'a que des équilibres dans des stratégies mixtes. |
| Keywords: | social network,opinion formation,targeting,extreme and centrist persuaders,réseau social,formation d'opinion,consensus,ciblage,lobbying |
| Date: | 2018–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-01720017&r=all |
| By: | Anne Van den Nouweland (University of Oregon [Eugene]); Agnieszka Rusinowska (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, PSE - Paris School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | We provide a bargaining foundation for the concept of ratio equilibrium in public good economies. We define a bargaining game of alternating offers in which players bargain to determine their cost shares of public good production and a level of public good. We study the stationary subgame perfect equilibrium without delay of the bargaining game. We demonstrate that when the players are perfectly patient, they are indifferent between the equilibrium offers of all players. We also show that every stationary subgame perfect equilibrium without delay in which the ratios offered by all players are the same leads to a ratio equilibrium. In addition, we demonstrate that all equilibrium ratios are offered by the players at some stationary subgame perfect equilibrium without delay. We use these results to discuss the case when the assumption of perfectly patient players is relaxed and the cost of delay vanishes. |
| Abstract: | Nous fournissons une base de négociation pour le concept d'équilibre des ratios dans les économies des biens publics. Nous définissons un jeu de négociation d'offres alternées dans lequel les joueurs négocient pour déterminer leurs parts de coûts de la production d'un bien public et un niveau d'un bien public. Nous étudions l'équilibre parfait en sous-jeu sans délai du jeu de négociation. Nous démontrons que lorsque les joueurs sont parfaitement patients, ils sont indifférents entre les offres d'équilibre de tous les joueurs. Nous montrons aussi que tout équilibre parfait en sous-jeu sans délai dans lequel les ratios offerts par tout les joueurs sont les mêmes conduit à un équilibre de ratios. En outre, nous démontrons que tous les ratios d'équilibre sont offerts par les joueurs à un équilibre parfait en sous-jeu sans délai. Nous utilisons ces résultats pour discuter le cas où l'hypothèse de joueurs parfaitement patients est relâchée et le coût de délai disparaît. |
| Keywords: | stationary subgame perfect equilibrium,public good economy,bargaining game,ratio equilibrium,équilibre des ratios,économie des biens publics,jeu de négociation,équilibre parfait en sous-jeux |
| Date: | 2018–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-01720001&r=all |
| By: | Takuo Sugaya (Stanford Graduate School of Business); Yuichi Yamamoto (Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania) |
| Abstract: | We study repeated games in which players learn the unknown state of the world by observing a sequence of noisy private signals. We find that for generic signal distributions, the folk theorem obtains using ex-post equilibria. In our equilibria, players commonly learn the state, that is, the state becomes asymptotic common knowledge. |
| Keywords: | repeated game, private monitoring, incomplete information, ex-post equilibrium, individual learning |
| JEL: | C72 C73 |
| Date: | 2019–04–26 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pen:papers:19-008&r=all |
| By: | Mikhail Drugov (New Economic School and CEPR); Dmitry Ryvkin (Department of Economics, Florida State University) |
| Abstract: | Tournaments are settings where agents' performance is determined jointly by effort and luck, and top performers are rewarded. We study the impact of the \shape of luck" { the details of the distribution of performance shocks { on incentives in tournaments. The focus is on the effect of competition, defined as the number of rivals an agent faces, which can be deterministic or stochastic. We show that individual and aggregate effort in tournaments are affected by an increase in competition in ways that depend critically on the shape of the density and failure (hazard) rate of shocks. When shocks have heavy tails, aggregate effort can decrease with stronger competition. |
| Keywords: | tournament, competition, heavy tails, stochastic number of players, unimodality, log-supermodularity, failure rate |
| JEL: | C72 D72 D82 |
| Date: | 2019–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:abo:neswpt:w0251&r=all |
| By: | Dell'Era, Michele |
| Abstract: | This paper studies expert advice when an influence-hungry expert derives an intrinsic benefit from influencing a client’s decision. A consulting paradox arises: the more the client needs advice, the less accurate is expert advice. The reason is that the expert’s benefit from influence engenders an incentive to misreport information which is positively related to the client’s need of advice. This paradox advances the debate on consulting beyond its focus on commissions and provides a new explanation to experts’ misreporting of information. Finally, the consulting paradox sheds light on the challenges posed by influence-hungry experts to client protection authorities and the consulting industry. |
| Keywords: | Expert Advice; Influence-Hungry Experts; Consulting Paradox |
| JEL: | D82 D83 M21 |
| Date: | 2019–05–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:93803&r=all |
| By: | de Meza, David; Reito, Francesco |
| Abstract: | In a simple model of the consumer credit market, we show that asymmetric information may enhance welfare relative to full information. The advantage of hidden types is that solvency and default constraints are relaxed, allowing beneficial lending. Prohibiting the use of observable information may therefore be efficient. It is also shown that rather than the nature of borrower heterogeneity, whether asymmetric information involves adverse or advantageous selection depends on the magnitude of default costs. Even when selection is adverse, lending and welfare may be higher under asymmetric information than under symmetric information. |
| Keywords: | consumer credit, overlending, credit rationing. |
| JEL: | D40 D6 D8 H2 |
| Date: | 2019–05–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:93700&r=all |
| By: | Nehring, Klaus; Puppe, Clemens |
| Abstract: | We propose a model of "frugal aggregation" in which the evaluation of social welfare must be based on information about agents' top choices plus general qualitative background conditions on preferences. The former is elicited individually, while the latter is not. We apply this model to problems of public budget allocation, relying on the specific assumption of separable and convex preferences. We propose and analyze a particularly aggregation rule called "Frugal Majority Rule." It is defined in terms of a suitably localized net majority relation. This relation is shown to be consistent, i.e. acyclic and decisive; its maxima minimize the sum of the natural resource distances to the individual tops. As a consequence of this result, we argue that the Condorcet and Borda perspectives - which con ict in the standard, ordinal setting - converge here. The second main result provides a crisp algorithmic characterization that renders the Frugal Majority Rule analytically tractable and efficiently computable. |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:kitwps:131&r=all |
| By: | Tiziano De Angelis; Erik Ekstr\"om |
| Abstract: | We study a class of optimal stopping games (Dynkin games) of preemption type, with uncertainty about the existence of competitors. The set-up is well-suited to model, for example, real options in the context of investors who do not want to publicly reveal their interest in a certain business opportunity. We show that there exists a Nash equilibrium in randomized stopping times which is described explicitly in terms of the corresponding one-player game. |
| Date: | 2019–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:1905.06564&r=all |
| By: | Eduardo Perez (Département d'économie); Vasiliki Skreta (University of Texas at Austin) |
| Abstract: | We characterize a receiver-optimal test when manipulations are possible in the form of type falsification. Optimal design exploits the following manipulator trade-off: while falsification may lead to better grades, it devalues their meaning. We show that optimal tests can be derived among falsification-proof ones. Our optimal test has a single ‘failing’ grade, and a continuum of ‘passing’ grades. It makes the manipulator indifferent across all moderate levels of falsification. Good types never fail, but bad types may pass. An optimal test delivers at least half of the full-information value to the receiver. A three-grade optimal test also performs well. |
| Keywords: | Information Design; Falsification; Tests; Manipulation; Cheating; Persuasion |
| JEL: | C72 D82 |
| Date: | 2018–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/31aa5v8jtp9p48jlhrq44psjoa&r=all |
| By: | Matthias Fahn; Regina Seibel (University of Zurich) |
| Abstract: | We study optimal employment contracts for present-biased employees who can conduct on-the-job search. Presuming that firms cannot offer long-term contracts, we find that individuals who are naive about their present bias will actually be better off than sophisticated or time-consistent individuals. Moreover, they search more, which partially counteracts the inefficiencies caused by their present bias. |
| Keywords: | Present bias, on-the-job search |
| JEL: | D21 D83 D90 J31 J32 |
| Date: | 2019–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jku:econwp:2019_09&r=all |
| By: | Eduardo Perez (Département d'économie) |
| Abstract: | This note gives a new proof of Blackwell’s celebrated result. The result is a bit stronger than the classical version since the action set and the prior are fixed, and only the utility of the decision maker varies. I show directly that a decision maker has access to a larger set of joint distributions over actions and states of the world if and only if her information improves in the garbling order. |
| Date: | 2017–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/5nek1jrask8ija3jouajnob09e&r=all |
| By: | Richard T. Holden; Anup Malani |
| Abstract: | Two parties sign a contract but before they fully perform they modify the contract. Should courts enforce the modified agreement? The modification may enable efficient trade in response to changed circumstances, or one party may have made an efficient relationship-specific investment and then been held-up by the other. Courts have had difficulty tackling this problem because the facts required to discriminate between the two situations are non-verifiable. A private remedy is for the parties to write a contract that is robust to hold-up or that makes the facts relevant to modification verifiable. But implementing such remedies requires commitment to the provisions, i.e., they themselves are subject to non-compliance. Conventional contract technology, e.g., the use of liquidated damages, to ensure commitment are disfavored by courts and subject to renegotiation. Smart contracts written on blockchain ledgers may offer a solution. We explain the basic economics of these technologies. We argue that they can used to implement liquidated damages without court involvement and thereby obtain commitment to renegotiation design and revelation mechanisms. We address the hurdles courts may impose to use of smart contracts and argue that sophisticated parties’ ex ante commitment to them may lead courts to allow their use as pre-commitment devices. |
| JEL: | D82 D86 K12 |
| Date: | 2019–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:25833&r=all |
| By: | Hunold, Matthias; Muthers, Johannes |
| Abstract: | We characterize mixed-strategy equilibria when capacity constrained suppliers can charge location-based prices to different customers. We establish an equilibrium with prices that weakly increase in the costs of supplying a customer. Despite prices above costs and excess capacities, each supplier exclusively serves its home market in equilibrium. Competition yields volatile market shares and an inefficient allocation of customers to firms. Even ex-post cross-supplies may restore efficiency only partly. We show that consumers may benefit from price discrimination whereas the the firms make the same profits as with uniform pricing. We use our findings to discuss recent competition policy cases and provide hints for a more refined coordinated-effects analysis. |
| Keywords: | Bertrand-Edgeworth,capacity constraints,inefficient competition,spatial price discrimination,subcontracting,transport costs |
| JEL: | L11 L41 L61 |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:dicedp:313&r=all |
| By: | Pierpaolo Battigalli; Martin Dufwenberg |
| Abstract: | The mathematical framework of psychological game theory is useful for describing many forms of motivation where preferences depend directly on own or othersbeliefs. It allows for incorporation of emotions, reciprocity, image concerns, and self-esteem in economic analysis. We explain how and why, discussing basic theory, a variety of sentiments, experiments, and applied work. Keywords: psychological game theory; belief-dependent motivation; reciprocity; emotions; image concerns; self-esteem JEL codes: C72; D91 |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:igi:igierp:646&r=all |
| By: | Annie Liang (Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania); Xiaosheng Mu (Columbia University); Vasilis Syrgkanis (Microsoft Corporation - Microsoft Research New England) |
| Abstract: | An agent has access to multiple data sources, each of which provides information about a different attribute of an unknown state. Information is acquired continuously where the agent chooses both which sources to sample from, and also how to allocate resources across them until an endogenously chosen time. We show that the optimal information acquisition strategy proceeds in stages, where resource allocation is constant over a fixed set of providers during each stage, and at each subsequent stage a new provider is added to the set. We additionally apply this characterization to derive results regarding: (1) equilibrium information provision by competing data providers, and (2) endogenous information acquisition in a binary choice problem. |
| Date: | 2019–04–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pen:papers:19-005&r=all |
| By: | Michel Grabisch (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne); Alexis Poindron (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne); Agnieszka Rusinowska (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne, PSE - Paris School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | We study a stochastic model of anonymous influence with conformist and anti-conformist individuals. Each agent with a ‘yes' or ‘no' initial opinion on a certain issue can change his opinion due to social influence. We consider anonymous influence, which depends on the number of agents having a certain opinion, but not on their identity. An individual is conformist/anti-conformist if his probability of saying ‘yes' increases/decreases with the number of ‘yes'- agents. In order to consider a society in which both conformists and anti-conformists co-exist, we investigate a generalized aggregation mechanism based on ordered weighted averages. Additionally, every agent has a coefficient of conformism which is a real number in [-1, 1], with negative/positive values corresponding to anti-conformists/conformists. The two extreme values -1 and 1 represent a pure anti-conformist and a pure conformist, respectively, and the remaining values - so called ‘mixed' agents. We consider two kinds of a society: without mixed agents, and with mixed agents who play randomly either as conformists or anti-conformists. For both cases of the model, we deliver a qualitative analysis of convergence, i.e., find all absorbing classes and conditions for their occurence. |
| Abstract: | Nous étudions un modèle d'influence anonyme en présence d'agents conformistes et anticonformistes. Chaque agent a une opinion initiale ‘oui' ou ‘non' pour un problème donné et, influencé par les opinions des autres agents, il met son opinion à jour période après période. Notre modèle est anonyme, c'est-à-dire, l'influence de la société sur chaque agent ne dépend que du nombre, et non de l'identité, d'agents avant telle ou telle opinion. Un agent est conformiste anticonformiste) si la probabilité qu'il dise ‘oui' à la prochaine période augmente lorsque davantage d'agents disent ‘oui' (‘non'). Afin d'étudier une société comportant les deux types d'agents, nous utilisons un mécanisme d'agrégation anonyme basé sur les moyennes pondérées ordonnées. Par ailleurs, à chaque agent est attribué un coefficient allant de -1 à 1. L'agent est anticonformiste si ce coefficient est négatif, il est conformiste s'il est positif. Les bornes -1 et 1 représentent les agents purs, les réels entre -1 et 1 strictement les agents qu'on appelle ‘mixtes'. Nous étudions deux types de société : sans agents mixtes, et avec des agents mixtes qui tirent à pile ou face pour choisir d'être conformistes ou anticonformistes. Nous proposons pour chaque cas une analyse qualitative de convergence, c'est-à-dire, une liste des classes absorbantes et les conditions d'occurrence. |
| Keywords: | anonymity,anti-conformism,convergence,absorbing class,influence,anonymat,anticonformisme,classe absorbante |
| Date: | 2017–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-01659328&r=all |