Studies in Games and Incentives

这个雄心勃勃的项目扩展了博弈论，并将博弈论应用于耐用品垄断和所得税审计的研究。更具体地说，该项目研究了博弈论均衡，即通过为玩家添加一种策略，使玩家能够获得原始游戏的均衡值，从而在原始游戏中衍生出游戏中的合理策略。早期的研究表明，这些均衡可以用来统一信号博弈的不同工作。这个项目的目标是将结果扩展到更一般的游戏中。提出了一个具有新消费者进入的动态垄断模型。这个模型似乎具有平稳均衡，在平稳均衡中，随着报价间隔时间的缩短，卖方失去了价格歧视的能力；在非平稳均衡中，卖方保持了一定的垄断权力。该项目开发了一个税收制定和执行的三级模型。政府设定税率、对违规行为的处罚以及审计员的预算。审计员决定审计哪些报告。纳税人决定申报多少收入。该项目的特点是线性的税收和审计预算，最大限度地发挥社会福利功能。所得到的特征描述用于找到审计师低于预算的最佳条件。这一令人振奋的项目对博弈论、产业组织和公共财政学做出了重要贡献。博弈论的研究发展并推广了一种新的方法，通过在原博弈中加入具有固定结果的策略来检验博弈结果的鲁棒性。产业组织的研究已经获得了令人惊讶的证据，证明价格歧视持续存在，这对政府政策有影响。这一扩展应能增进我们对耐用商品垄断者通过周期性销售进行价格歧视的能力的理解。第三部分发现中等收入纳税人被国税局过度审计的证据。该项目这一部分使用的所得税审计分层模型应该为公共财政提供其他新颖的见解。

This ambitious project extends game theory and applies game theory to the study of durable goods monopoly and income tax auditing. More specifically, the project examines game theoretic equilibria that are rationalizable strategies in a game derived from the original game by adding a strategy for a player which allows that player to get the equilibrium value of the original game for sure. Earlier work has shown that these equilibria can be used to unify different work on signalling games. The goal of this project is to extend the results to more general games. A model of dynamic monopoly with entry of new consumers is characterized. This model seems to have stationary equilibria in which the seller loses the ability to price discriminate as the time between offers shrinks, and nonstationary equilibria in which the seller maintains some monopoly power. The project develops a three-level model of tax setting and enforcement. The government sets tax rates, penalties for noncompliance, and a budget for the auditor. The auditor determines which reports to audit. Taxpayers determine how much income to report. The project characterizes the linear tax and auditing budget that maximizes a social welfare function. The resulting characterization is used to find conditions under which it is optimal for the auditor to be under budgeted. This exciting project makes important contributions to game theory, industrial organization and public finance. The research in game theory develops and generalizes a new way of examining the robustness of the results obtained from games by adding strategies with fixed outcomes to the original game. The work in industrial organization has already obtained surprising evidence of the persistence of price discrimination that has implications for government policy. The extensions should improve our understanding of the ability of durable good monopolists to price discriminate via periodic sales. The third part finds evidence that the middle-income taxpayers are over-audited by the IRS. The hierarchical model of income tax auditing used for this part of the project should provide other novel insights in public finance.