We study the implications of a particular form of irrationality on the pricing behavior of firms in a monopolistic-competitive market with incomplete information. We assume that firms are overconfident, meaning that they over-estimate their abilities to understand the correct model of the...

This paper is a study of the shape and structure of the distribution of prices at which an identical good is sold in a given market and time period. We find that the typical price distribution is symmetric and leptokurtic, with a standard deviation between 19% and 36%. Only 10% of the variance...

Using a unique and comprehensive data source, we measure price changes for Microsoft's desktop personal computer software products during the time period July 1993 through June 2001. This paper contributes to a relatively small literature on price measurement of pre-packaged software by...

Results of hedonic price regressions for personal computer operating systems and productivity suites advertised in PC World magazine by retail vendors during the time period 1984 to 2000 are reported. Among the quality attribute variables we use are new measures capturing the presence of network...

We document that the recent decline in aggregate volatility has been accompanied by a large increase in firm level risk. The negative relationship between firm and aggregate risk seems to be present across industries in the US, and across OECD countries. Firm volatility increases after...

I suppose that consumers see a firm as fair if they cannot reject the hypothesis that the firm is somewhat benevolent towards them. Consumers that can reject this hypothesis become angry, which is costly to the firm. I show that firms that wish to avoid this anger will keep their prices rigid...

Public attention has focused on how the launch of the national health exchanges could impact the types of risks who initially enroll and thereby affect future premiums and enrollment. We introduce simple dynamics into a standard model of insurance under adverse selection to show that such...

Economists argue that rich information environments and formal enforcement of contracts are necessary to prevent market failures when information asymmetries exist. We test for the necessity of formal enforcement to overcome the problems of asymmetric information by estimating the value of...

While most empirical analysis of prediction markets treats prices of binary options as predictions of the probability of future events, Manski (2004) has recently argued that there is little existing theory supporting this practice. We provide relevant analytic foundations, describing sufficient...

We develop tests for common values at first-price sealed-bid auctions. Our tests are nonparametric, require observation only of the bids submitted at each auction, and are based on the fact that the winner's curse' arises only in common values auctions. The tests build on recently developed...