Collaborative Research: The Economics of Expertise

决策者面临的各种问题几乎排除了他们拥有在所有领域作出知情判断所需的专门知识的可能性。因此，决策权往往与相关的专业知识脱节。决策者和专家之间的“分工”是本研究的重点。具体地说，它的目标是分析单个决策者和他可能选择向其寻求建议的多名专家之间的战略相互作用。利用信息经济学和博弈论的工具，该项目将对一个足够广泛的模型进行理论分析，以使其与各种机构设置保持一致。特别令人关切的情况是，决策者能够咨询多位专家，因此是多条有时相互矛盾的咨询意见的接受者。此外，这一建议并非由完全不偏不倚的各方提供：专家的利益可能与决策者的利益不一致，即使与之不一致。后者的任务是有效地汇总在这种环境中收到的信息。将解决三个广泛的问题。第一个问题涉及专业知识和忠诚度之间的权衡，后者决定了专家的利益与决策者的利益的一致性程度。解决的一些问题是：决策者应该如何整合同样熟练但忠诚度不同的专家的意见？有没有可能通过挑拨离间，让专家们披露更多的信息？“低级”专家的建议一定要被忽视吗？应该咨询多少专家？第二个问题涉及补偿和授权这两个问题。专家的建议应该如何得到补偿？最优薪酬方案能带来充分披露吗？决策者应该在什么时候将决策的权力委托给专家？该项目的第三部分将探讨上述总结的研究对从不完全知情的代理人获得信息的一般问题的一些更广泛的影响。事实上，决策者不能可信地致力于一种行动方针，一种机制，这一事实将这个问题与传统的机制设计理论中所考虑的问题区分开来。特别是，与传统理论的教训相反，实现充分披露和第一好的结果是困难的。

The diverse range of problems faced by decision makers almost precludes the possibility of their possessing the expertise needed to make informed judgements in all areas. As a result, the power to make decisions is often divorced from the relevant specialized knowledge. It is the `division of labor` between decision makers and experts that is the focus of this research. Specifically, its goal is to analyze the strategic interplay between a single decision maker and a number of experts from whom he might choose to seek advice. Employing tools from the economics of information and game theory, the project will undertake a theoretical analysis of a model broad enough to be consistent with a variety of institutional settings. Of particular concern are situations in which the decision maker is able to consult multiple experts and, thus, is the recipient of multiple, sometimes conflicting, pieces of advice. Moreover, this advice is not given by completely disinterested parties: the experts may have interests which, even if not at odds with, are not coincident with those of the decision maker. The latter's task is then to aggregate the information received in such an environment effectively. Three broad sets of issues will be addressed. The first concerns the tradeoff between expertise and loyalty, the latter determining how closely an expert's interests are aligned with those of the decision maker. Some questions addressed are: How should a decision maker integrate the opinions of experts who are equally proficient but have differing loyalties? Is it possible to get the experts to disclose more information by playing one off against the other? Should the advice of `inferior` experts necessarily be ignored? How many experts should be consulted? The second relates to the twin issues of compensation and delegation. How should experts be compensated for their advice? Can optimal compensation schemes lead to full disclosure? When should a decision maker delegate the authority to make decisions to an expert? The third part of the project will explore some wider implications of the research summarized above to the general question of information elicitation from imperfectly informed agents. The fact that the decision maker cannot credibly commit to a course of action, a mechanism, distinguishes this problem from that traditionally considered in mechanism design theory. In particular, contrary to the lessons of the traditional theory, achieving full-disclosure and first-best outcomes is difficult.