The Slutsky matrix function encodes all the information about local variations in demand with respect to small (Slutsky) compensated price changes. When the demand function is the result of utility maximization the Slutsky matrix is symmetric. However, symmetry does not imply rationality. Here,...

The Nash program is an important research agenda initiated in Nash (Econometrica 21:128-140, 1953) in order to bridge the gap between the noncooperative and cooperative counterparts of game theory. The program is thus turning sixty-seven years old, but I will argue it is not ready for...

We extend Nash's bargaining theory to non-convex and coalitional problems. This paper investigates the implications of Nash-like axioms for bilateral problems and the properties of consistency and converse consistency over multilateral settings. The result is a characterization of the Nash set...

Consider an exchange economy with a finite number of agents, who are arbitragers, in that they try to upset allocations imagining plausible beneficial trades. Their thought process is interactive, in that agents are conscious that the others are also going through the same steps. With this...

Given any observed demand behavior by means of a demand function, we quantify by how much it departs from rationality. Using a recent elaboration of the "almost implies near" principle, the measure of the gap is the smallest norm of the correcting matrix that would yield a Slutsky matrix with...

We study the long-run stability of trade networks in a two-sided economy of agents labelled men and women. Each agent desires relationships with the other type, but having multiple partners is costly. This cost-benefit trade-off results in each agent having a single-peaked utility over the...

An information transaction entails the purchase of information. Formally, it consists of an information structure together with a price. We develop an index of the appeal of information transactions, which is derived as a dual to the agent's preferences for information. The index of information...

Restricting attention to economic environments, we study implementation under perturbed better-response dynamics (BRD). A social choice function (SCF) is implementable in stochastically stable strategies of perturbed BRD whenever the only outcome supported by the stochastically stable strategies...

Watson (2002) proposes non-forcing contracts as a way to show the limitations of the mechanism design program with ex-post renegotiation (Maskin and Moore (1999)). If one takes a partial implementation approach, as Watson does, we show that non-forcing contracts do not constitute an intermediate...