This paper analyzes public intervention in education, taking into account the existence of two educational levels: basic education and college education. The government decides per capita expenditure at each level and the subsidy for college education. We explore the effects of transferring...

The belief that peers' characteristics influence the behavior and outcomes of students in school has been important in shaping public policy. How peers affect individuals depends on the educational system prevailing. I analyze two different systems: tracking and mixing, and I propose several...

This paper reports an experimental investigation on two mechanisms for the so-called King Solomon Dilemma, where one of them fails to implement the social choice rule dynamically. We compare the two mechanisms in terms of their welfare, incentive and learning properties.

This paper studies the problem of spreading a product (an idea or a technology) among agents in a social network. An agent obtains the product with a probability that depends on the spreading rate (or degree of contagion) of the product as well as on the behaviour of the agent?s neighbours. This...

We study a setting in which individual players choose their partners as well as a mode of behavior in 2 x 2 anti-coordination games -- games where a player's best response is to behave differently than the opponent. We characterize the nature of equilibrium networks as well as study the effects...

There is a recent tendency toward encouraging universities to merge. This policy is based on the idea that mergers create synergy gains that enhance universities’ prestige by increasing their international visibility. However, this process may reduce competition for both research funds and...

Household characteristics may have long-run effects on individual outcomes in adulthood. For instance, individuals who lived when young in households experiencing financial problems are more likely to be poor when adults. Public intervention in education is one of the most important means by...