This paper has a dual purpose. First, I present a new modeling of partial naivete, and apply this to the analysis of procrastination. The decision maker is assumed to have stationary behavior and to be partially naive in the sense of perceiving that his current preferences may persist in the...

The paper explores how repeated revisions of consumption plans increase long-run utility. If agents value present anticipations of future consumption, some revisions may be viewed as a benign form of self-delusion. We consider a minimal generalization of the Samuelson discounted utility model to...

We investigate the role that self-control problems modeled as time-inconsistent, present-biased preferences and a person's awareness of those problems might play in leading people to develop and maintain harmful addictions. Present-biased preferences create a tendency to over-consume addictive...

Recent models of procrastination due to self-control problems assume that a procrastinator considers just one option and is unaware of her self-control problems. We develop a model where a person chooses from a menu of options and is partially aware of her self-control problems. This menu model...

The authors show how microeconomic concepts and principles are applicable to the study of terrorism. The utility maximization model provides insights into both terrorist resource allocation choices and government counterterrorism efforts, while basic game theory helps characterize the strategic...

The choice between performing a task today or procrastinating it until tomorrow or later is the building block of any economic action. In our paper we aim to enrich the theoretical literature on procrastination by outlining conditions for bad and good procrastination and looking at the special...

I examine the circumstances under which a sophisticated time-inconsistent decisionmaker (i) will not or (ii) need not severely miscoordinate her behavior across time, in the sense of following a course of action which fails to be Pareto-optimal for the sequence of temporal selves of the...

We consider a supply channel composed of one manufacturer and two symmetric retailers. Three cases are studied. The non-cooperation case is a leader-follower relationship. The manufacturer determines his spending in national advertising and the wholesale price. Then, retailers determine...

This is Part II of a study of the axiomatic and its recent applications to game theory and resource allocation. Part I is a user's guide. Part II discusses alternatives to the axiomatic method and answers criticisms often addressed at the axiomatic method.

This paper analyzes the self-identification process and its role in motivation. We build a model of self-confidence where people have imperfect knowledge about their ability, which in most tasks is a complement to effort in determining performance. High self-confidence thus enhances motivation,...