We examine an environment with n voters each with a private value over two alternatives. We compare the social surplus of two mechanisms for deciding between them: majority voting and shouting. In majority voting, the choice with the most votes wins. With shouting, the voter who shouts the...

We present a costly voting model in which each voter has a private valuation for their preferred outcome of a vote. When there is a zero cost to voting, all voters vote and hence all values are counted equally regardless of how high they may be. By having a cost to voting, only those with high...

We formulate a way to study whether the asymmetry of buyers (in the sense of having different prior probability distributions of valuations) is helpful to the seller in private-value auctions (asked first by Cantillon [2001]). In our proposed formulation, this question corresponds to two...

We study asymmetric second-price auctions under incomplete information. The bidders have potentially different, commonly-known, valuations for the object and private information about their entry costs. The seller, however, does not benefit from these entry costs. We calculate the equilibrium...

Gift giving is thought to be welfare decreasing. This claim rests on two key assumptions, namely, full information as to the whereabouts of all goods and the ability to reach the stores that carry desired goods costlessly. We replace these two assumptions with the more realistic assumptions of...

In first- and second-price private value auctions with sequential bidding, second movers may discover the first movers' bid. Equilibrium behavior in the first-price auction is mostly unaffected but there are multiple equilibria in the second-price auction. Consequently, comparative statics...

Political parties in Northern Ireland recently used a divisor method of apportionment to choose, in sequence, ten cabinet ministries. If the parties have complete information about each others' preferences, we show that it may not be rational for them to act sincerely by choosing their...