We consider a general scheme to construct Bayesian incentive compatible mechanisms using a suitable 'variable mechanism parametrization.' The key idea is to perturb a given direct mechanism, which might not be truth revealing, introducing sufficient variability as a function of agents'...

We consider a general screening model with payoff externalities and type-dependent feasibility constraints. The principal can design contract instruments of arbitrary dimension to influence each agent's valuation of the proposed transaction, which also depends on the anticipated choice of other...

This paper studies the problem of a monopolistic platform which offers agents connection with one another. Agents have heterogeneous characteristics that are valued by some other agents and observed privately by the principal. The agents are privately informed about their heterogeneous...

We study a dynamic model of monopolistic provision of commitment devices to sophisticated, Strotzian decision makers. We allow for unobservable heterogeneity at the contracting stage in the agents' preferences for commitment vs. flexibility. The first-best contracts under complete information...

We characterize optimal voluntary disclosures by a privately informed agent facing a counterparty endowed with market power in a bilateral transaction. Although disclosures reveal some of the agent's private information, they may increase his information rents by mitigating the counterparty's...

We propose a tractable framework to introduce externalities in a screening model. Agents differ in both payoff-type and influence (how strongly their actions affect others). Applications range from pricing network goods to regulating industries that create externalities. Inefficiencies arise...

We present a model of price discrimination where a monopolist faces a consumer who is privately informed about the distribution of his valuation for an indivisible unit of good but has yet to learn privately the actual valuation. The monopolist sequentially screens the consumer with a menu of...

We study optimal contracting between a firm selling a divisible good that exhibits positive externality and a group of agents in a social network. The extent of externality that each agent receives from the consumption of neighboring agents is privately held and is unknown to the firm. By...

This paper proposes a mechanism design approach, capable of endogenizing a monopolist's choice between selling and renting in a non-anonymous durable goods setting with short-term commitment. Allowing for mechanisms that determine the good’s allocation not only at the beginning but also at the...

This paper considers a multi-period setting where a monopolist, with short-term commitment, rents one unit of a durable good to a single consumer in every period. The consumer's valuation constitutes his private information and remains constant over time. By using a mechanism design approach,...