In the presence of a time-inconsistency problem with optimal agency contracts, we show that competitive markets implement allocations that Pareto dominate those achieved by a benevolent planner, they induce strictly more effort, and they sometimes make the commitment problem disappear entirely....

Urban water conservation is typically achieved through prescriptive regulations, including the rationing of water for particular uses and requirements for the installation of particular technologies. A significant shift has occurred in pollution control regulations toward market-based policies...

Since no stable matching mechanism can induce truth-telling as a dominant strategy for all participants, there is often room in matching markets for strategic misrepresentation (Roth [25]). In this paper we study a natural form of strategic misrepresentation: reporting a truncation of one's true...

A costless signaling mechanism has been proposed as a device to improve welfare in decentralized two-sided matching markets. An example of such an environment is a job market for new Ph.D. economists. We study a market game of incomplete information between firms and workers and show that...