It is well known that ex post efficient mechanisms for the provision of indivisible public goods are not interim individually rational. However, the corresponding literature assumes that agents who veto a mechanism can enforce a situation in which the public good is never provided. This paper...

This paper provides a theoretical foundation that supports the degressive proportionality principle in apportionment problems, such as the allocation of seats in a federal parliament. The utility assigned by an individual to a constitutional rule is a function of the frequency with which each...

We consider hybrid procedures: a first step of reducing the game by iterated elimination of weakly dominated strategies (IEWDS) followed by a second step of applying an equilibrium refinement. We show that the set of perfect/proper outcomes of a reduced normal-form game might be larger than the...

This paper provides a theoretical foundation which supports the degressive proportionality principle in apportionment problems. The core of the argument is that each individual derives utility from the fact that the collective decision matches her own will with some frequency, with marginal...

This paper analyzes the optimal size of a deliberating committee where (i) there is no conflict of interest among individuals and (ii) information acquisition is costly. The committee members simultaneously decide whether to acquire information, and then make the ex-post efficient decision. The...

Reformen haben – auch wenn sie sich langfristig positiv auf die Mehrheit der Bevölkerung auswirken – nicht immer den Rückhalt bei den Wählern, der bei rein ökonomischer Betrachtungsweise wünschenswert wäre. Wie lassen sich „unliebsame“ Reformen besser „verkaufen“? Was sollten...

Eine Politik der Verringerung der Arbeitslosigkeit über mehr Flexibilität des Arbeitsmarktes stößt auf den Widerstand der Arbeitsplatzbesitzer als Verlierer entsprechender Maßnahmen. Wie könnten die Interessen der Insider in ein Reformpaket einbezogen werden?

Optimal voting rules have to be adjusted to the underlying distribution of preferences. However, in practice there usually is no social planner who can perform this task. This paper shows that the introduction of a stage at which agents may themselves choose voting rules according to which they...

We show that direct investments by consumers without the use of financial intermediaries can efficiently allocate financial capital to firms seeking funding for production of a novel consumption good. In our setting, consumers are also investors, and their privately known consumption preferences...

Abstract We study a one-shot information aggregation problem in which agents have to provide effort in order to understand the information they are supposed to process. Agents have a common interest in reaching a good decision but suffer from an individual cost of providing effort. Showing that...