Mechanism design with costly verification

该奖项资助了三个经济理论方面的项目。第一部分研究了委托人有机会以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，他必须决定组织的几个部门中哪一个部门将允许新员工。主管希望将该职位分配给能够以最能促进整个组织发展的方式填补该职位的部门。然而，每个部门都比领导拥有更多关于本部门求职者的信息。主管可能会考虑投入一些资金来核实每个部门对求职者的陈述；通过这样做，领导可以促进组织的整体利益。但与此同时，负责人必须记住，用于验证信息的资源不能用于满足组织的其他目标。第二个项目考虑了一类特殊的匹配模型。在这类模型中，比赛参与者会在比赛前就个人职业选择做出决定。每个人都必须权衡每个职业提供的满足感和报酬。然而，人们也明白，他们将参与比赛，并可能找到一个合作伙伴。合伙人分享收入；因此，期望找到高收入伴侣的人有动机选择一份非常满意但收入较低的工作。第三个项目着眼于影响企业选择某些产品特性的激励因素。最近，经济学家开发了许多“诱惑”模型，在这些模型中，消费者在今天做出决定的同时，可能低估了他们控制自己明天行为的能力。在这些模型中，消费者可以获得的产品的特性是给定的。然而，在现实中，公司通常必须选择特定产品的“诱人”程度；香烟中的尼古丁含量，酒中的酒精含量等。该项目将考虑企业如何做出这些选择，以及诸如“罪恶税”之类的政府政策如何影响这些选择。这些项目都适用于设计政策和激励计划，以解决各种社会问题。

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.