Mechanism design with costly verification

该奖项资助了三个经济理论项目。 第一部分研究委托人有机会以一定的代价验证代理人类型时的最优机制。 例如，考虑一个组织的负责人所面临的问题，他必须决定组织中的几个部门中的哪一个将被允许雇用新员工。 领导想把这个职位分配给能以最好的方式促进整个组织的部门。 然而，每个部门都比领导者拥有更多关于自己的求职者的信息。 主管可能会考虑投资一些钱来核实每个部门对求职者的陈述;通过这样做，主管可以促进组织的整体利益。 但与此同时，领导者必须记住，用于验证信息的资源不能用于满足组织的其他目标。 第二个项目考虑一个特定的匹配模型类。 在这类模型中，比赛中的参与者将在比赛之前就个人职业选择做出决定。 每个人都必须权衡每种职业提供的满意度和报酬。 然而，人们也明白，他们将参加比赛，并可能找到一个合作伙伴。 合作伙伴分享收入;因此，那些期望与高收入合伙人匹配的人有动机选择一份高满意度但低收入的工作。第三个项目着眼于影响公司选择某些产品特征的动机。 最近，经济学家开发了一些“诱惑”模型，在这些模型中，消费者今天做出决定，而可能低估了他们控制明天行为的能力。 在这些模型中，消费者可获得的产品的特性被认为是给定的。 然而，在现实中，企业往往必须选择特定产品的“诱惑”程度;例如，香烟中的尼古丁含量、酒类中的酒精含量等。该项目将考虑企业如何做出这些选择，以及“罪恶税”等政府政策如何影响这些选择。这些项目各自适用于解决各种社会问题的政策和激励计划的设计。

This award funds three projects in economic theory. The first part of the research studies optimal mechanisms when the principal has the opportunity to verify the types of the agents at a cost. For example, consider the problem faced by the head of an organization who must decide which of several divisions in the organization will be allowed a new hire. The head wants to allocate this job slot to the division that would fill the position in the way that best promotes the organization as a whole. However, each division has more information than the leader about its own job applicants. The head may want to consider investing some money in verifying the statements made by each division about the job applicants; by doing this the head can promote the organization's overall interests. But at the same time the head must remember that the resources spent to verify information are not available to meet the organization's other goals. The second project considers a particular class of matching models. In this class of models, participants in the match will make decisions in advance of the match about individual career choice. Each person must weigh both the satisfaction and pay that each career provides. However, people also understand that they will participate in the match and may find a partner. Partners share income; therefore someone who anticipates matching to a high-income partner has an incentive to choose a highly satisfying but low paying job.The third project looks at the incentives that affect a firm's choice of certain product characteristics. Recently economists have developed a number of models of "temptation", in which consumers make decisions today while perhaps under-estimating their ability to control their actions tomorrow. In these models, the characteristics of the products available to consumers are taken as given. However, in reality firms often must choose the degree to which a specific product is "tempting"; eg, the nicotine level in a cigarette, the alcohol level in liquor, etc. This project will consider how firms make these choices, and how government policies such as "sin taxes" affect these choices.These projects are each applicable to the design of policies and incentive plans to address a variety of social problems.