We investigate the impact of charity tie-ins on transaction probabilities and sale prices using a large database of eBay auctions. We examine "natural experiments" of precisely matched clusters of charity and non-charity auctions with identical titles, subtitles, sellers, and start prices. We...

To study whether consumers will pay more for products that generate charitable donations, we analyze data from eBay on charity and noncharity auctions of otherwise identical products. Charity prices are 6 percent higher, on average, than noncharity prices. Bids below the closing price are also...

This paper presents a game theoretic analysis of the generalized second-price auction that the company Overture operated in 2004 to sell sponsored search listings on search engines. We construct a model that embodies few prior assumptions about parameters, and we present results that indicate...

This paper uses a unique data set of Latin American paintings auctioned by Sotheby's between 1995 and 2002 to investigate several puzzles from the recent auctions literature. Our results suggest that: (1) the reputation of an artist and the provenance of the artwork, omitted variables in most...

We study two-stage political contests with private entry costs. We show that these political contests could be ineffective, namely, the chance of low ability candidates participating in the contest might be higher than the chance of high ability candidates participating in the contest (and...

We analyze optimal schemes for privatization in a transitional economy. In many cases, established Western firms are good candidates for large shareholders of a local firm, since the sale of the shares can generate large amount of revenues and furthermore, in the future, the home country can...

We study optimal contest design in situations where the designer can reward high performance agents with positive prizes and punish low performance agents with negative prizes. We link the optimal prize structure to the curvature of distribution of abilities in the population. In particular, we...

We construct a model to analyse the two types of tender procedures used by the European Central Bank (ECB) in its open market operations. We assume that the ECB minimizes the expected value of a loss function that depends on the quadratic difference between the interbank rate and a target...

We study asymmetric all-pay auctions with multiple objects where players’ values for the objects are common knowledge. The players have different values for the objects but they have the same ranking. The contest designer may award one prize including all the objects to the player with the...

The design of cost minimizing procurement rules for the selection of contractors among distinct technological groups requires the favouritism of inefficient firms. It is unclear whether these policies provide incentives for inefficient firms to adopt more efficient technologies. In this paper...