We develop a model of college assignment as a large contest wherein students with heterogeneous abilities compete for … approximate the outcomes of a game with large, but finite, sets of colleges and students. By incorporating two common families of … cost of competition as the welfare difference between a color-blind admissions contest and the first-best outcome chosen by …

depends substantially on the strength of one's competition. Second, we find evidence of a counter-intuitive role for …

field experiment designed to mimic important aspects of competitive investment prior to the college market. We pay students … seats, and alter the relative competition between blacks and whites. We present a theory of AA in university admissions … for the majority of disadvantaged students targeted by the policy, by mitigating so-called "discouragement effects." The …

matching process. Under this assumption, a centralized matching market can often outperform a decentralized one. Using a quasi-experiment … students to learn about universities and accepting a university that turns out to be inferior causes regret. We discuss and …

matching process. Under this assumption, a centralized matching market can often outperform a decentralized one. Using a quasi-experiment … students to learn about universities and accepting a university that turns out to be inferior causes regret. We discuss and …