CAREER: Economic Analysis of Online Mercantile Processes

这个教师早期职业发展（CAREER）赠款将调查企业对消费者（B2C）的在线拍卖机制，正在由在线商家设计。拍卖传统上用于出售单个物品，买家之间的估值差异很大。然而，电子市场创造了一种新的经济环境，在这种环境中，商品的买卖使用了包括各种拍卖机制在内的各种商业程序。本研究的目的是从消费者和销售者的角度来研究这种新的市场环境。通常，在线拍卖要求卖家从各种参数中进行选择。 考虑到产品的特性和将被吸引到这些拍卖的消费者群体，每个拍卖可以被设计为最大化从该拍卖产生的收入。另一方面，消费者可以选择某些策略，以最大限度地提高他们以尽可能低的价格购买产品的机会。 这项研究将为卖家和消费者开发各种类型的在线拍卖的分析模型。 分析结果将通过实验研究进行验证。研究结果将用于本科生和研究生管理课程，以提高学生对经济环境中各种代理人激励机制的理解。 研究结果还将通过发表在权威期刊和会议上的方式提供给科学界。

This Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) grant will investigate business-to-consumer (B2C) online auction mechanisms that are being engineered by online merchants. Auctions were traditionally used for selling single items with a wide dispersion in valuations among buyers. However, electronic markets have enabled a new economic environment where commodities are now bought and sold using a wide array of mercantile processes that include a variety of auction mechanisms. The goal of this research is to study this new market environment from both consumers' and sellers' perspectives. Typically, on-line auctions require sellers to choose from various parameters. Given the characteristics of the product and the consumer population that will be attracted to these auctions, each auction can be designed to maximize the revenue generated from that auction. On the other hand, consumers can choose certain strategies to maximize the chances that they purchase products at the lowest possible prices. The study will develop analytical models of various types of online auctions, both for sellers and consumers. The analytical results will be validated by experimental studies. The results of the study will be used in undergraduate and graduate management classes to enhance students' understanding of incentives of various agents in the economic environment. The results will also be made available to scientific community through publications in refereed journals and conferences.