According to a minimalist version of Afriat’s theorem, a consumer behaves as a utility maximizer if and only if a feasibility matrix associated with his choices is cyclically consistent. An “essential experiment” consists of observed consumption bundles <InlineEquation ID="IEq1"> <EquationSource Format="TEX">$$(x_{1}, \ldots , x_{n})$$</EquationSource> </InlineEquation> and a...</equationsource></inlineequation>

Alvin Roth and Lloyd Shapley have received in 2012 the Sveriges Riksbank prize in economic sciences in memory of Alfred Nobel, for their work on the centralized organization of some economic markets, which rely on the matching of agents of two different types (students and schools, for...

We study the question of collusion in auctions. We start by presenting a model of a first price auction with complete information and direct asymmetric externalities. Following a non-cooperative approach we study the negotiations process which yields a cartel. We show that in the presence of...