This paper presents a tractable framework for studying frictionless matching in school, work, and marriage when individuals have heterogeneous social and cognitive skills. In the model, there are gains to specialization and team production, but specialization requires communication and...

In this paper I study the assignment between machines of heterogeneous qualities and workers of heterogeneous skills in an infinite-horizon economy with matching frictions. I characterize first the efficient assignment and then the decentralizing market equilibrium. The efficient allocation...

If entitlement to Unemployment Insurance (UI) benefits must be earned with employment, generous UI is an additional benefit to an employment relationship, so it promotes job creation. If individuals are risk neutral, UI is fairly priced, and the UI system prevents moral-hazard, the generosity of...

In frictional matching markets, buyers incur discrete inspection costs when assessing the suitability of goods on offer, and sellers incur discrete 'show' costs. This paper studies how intermediaries can help reduce these costs. Intermediaries, whose value derives from inventory, learning and...

The Chinese government implemented the One Child Policy (OCP) in an attempt to ameliorate the population explosion and its potential negative economic consequences on their infant economy in 1979. Here the consequences of this policy for marital matching and family size decisions are examined. A...

This paper shows that the Mortensen-Pissarides search and matching model can be successfully parameterized to generate observed large cyclical fluctuations in unemployment and modest responses of unemployment to changes in unemployment insurance (UI) benefits. The key features behind this...