In this paper I examine the socially optimal allocation in a random matching economy. The optimal allocation is supported by punishment to defections, using the public record of agents<92> transaction. However, public record-keeping is imperfect, as an agent<92>s transaction is updated into the public...</92></92>

In this paper we study the inefficiencies of the monetary equilibrium and optimal monetary policies in a search economy. We show that the same frictions that give fiat money a positive value generate an inefficient quantity of goods in each trade and an inefficient number of trades (or search...

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...

We analyze bureaucracy and corruption in a market with decentralized exchange and <93>lemons.<94> Exchange is modelled as a sequence of bilateral, random matches. Agents have private information about the quality of goods they produce and can supplement trade with socially inefficient bribes....</94></93>

This paper addresses why it is beneficial for a society to restrict the use of nominal bonds as a means of payment for goods. The model has a centralized asset market and a decentralized goods market. Individuals face matching shocks that affect the marginal utility of consumption, but they...

In this paper we consider learning from search as a mechanism to understand the relationship between unemployment duration and search outcomes as a labor market equilibrium. We rely on the assumption that workers do not have precise knowledge of their job finding probabilities and therefore,...

I construct a theoretical framework in which firms offer wage-tenure contracts to direct the search by risk-averse workers. All workers can search, on or off the job. I characterize an equilibrium and prove its existence. The equilibrium generates a non-degenerate, continuous distribution of...

Suppose that n buyers each want one unit and m sellers each have one or more units of a good. Sellers post prices, and then buyers choose sellers. In symmetric equilibrium, similar sellers all post one price, and buyers randomize. Hence, more or fewer buyers may arrive than a seller can...

This paper contributes to the search theory of unemployment by endogenously generating matching functions for skilled and unskilled workers from a wage-posting game. The model is capable of producing a positive skill premium and a positive wage differential among homogeneous unskilled workers....

This paper is the first step in the integration of the (search-theoretic) microfoundation of monetary theory into the fruitful analysis by Lucas (1990). I construct two search models, in which fiat money coexists in equilibrium with default-free nominal bonds issued by the government, and then...