We provide a characterization of participants' behavior in a contest or tournament where the marginal productivity of effort varies across contestants and individual productivity is private information. We then consider the optimal design of such a contest. <p>We first analyze contestant behavior...</p>

We provide a characterization of participants' behavior in a contest or tournament where the marginal productivity of effort varies across contestants and individual productivity is private information. We then consider the optimal design of such a contest. We first analyze contestant behavior...