We offer a general framework to study procurement auctions when quality matters. In this environment, sellers compete for a project by bidding a price-quality pair, and the winning bidder is determined by the score assigned to each bid. In contrast to the existing study in which only the...

This paper analyzes the impact of the reserve price on participation and the degree of competition in competitive tenderingfor public contracts. Our approach aims at reconciling the most recent developments in auction theory with the more practicalissues arising in centralized public...

This paper assesses the effects of changes in scoring weights in auctions, using a unique sample of biddings of private Welfare-to-Work (WTW) organizations to reintegrate groups of unemployed and disabled workers. WTW-organizations did not only bid on prices, but also received points for three...

Contracts providing payments for not developing natural areas, or for removing cropland from production, generally require long-term commitments. Landowners, however, can decide to prematurely terminate the contract when the opportunity cost of complying with conservation requirements increases....

This discussion paper led to an article in the <I>European Economic Review</I> (2014). Vol. 71(October), pages 1-14.<P> This paper assesses the effects of changes in scoring weights in auctions, using a unique sample of biddings of private Welfare-to-Work (WTW) organizations to reintegrate groups of...</p></i>

This paper assesses the effects of changes in scoring weights in auctions, using a unique sample of bids from private Welfare-to-Work (WTW) service providers to reintegrate groups of unemployed and disabled workers. These providers received points for their price bids and for three proxies of...

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...

The conventional wisdom in the auction design literature is that first price sealed bid auctions tend to make more money while ascending auctions tend to be more efficient. We re-examine these issues in an environment in which bidders are allowed to endogenously choose in which auction format to...

Ivanova-Stenzel and Salmon (2004a) established some interesting yet puzzling results regarding bidders’ preferences between auction formats. The finding is that bidders strongly prefer the ascending to the first price sealed bid auction on a ceteris paribus basis but they are not willing...

This is a preliminary draft of an Invited Symposium paper for the World Congress of the Econometric Society to be held in Seattle in August 2000. We discuss the strong connections between auction theory and 'standard' economic theory, and argue that auction-theoretic tools and intuitions can...