We study markets in which agents first make investments and are then matched into potentially productive partnerships. Equilibrium investments and the equilibrium matching will be efficient if agents can simultaneously negotiate investments and matches, but we focus on markets in which agents...

This paper investigates conditions under which the adverse selection principal-agent problem can be decomposed into a collection of pointwise maximization problems. The analysis uses an extension of the type assignment approach to optimal nonuniform pricing, pioneered by Goldman, Leland and...

We formulate a dynamic learning-and-adjustment model of a market in which sellers choose signals that potentitally reveal their types. If the dynamic process selects a unique limiting outcome, then that outcome must be an undefeated equilibrium; though to be undefeated does not suffice to be the...

Extreme adverse selection arises when private information has unbounded support, and market breakdown occurs when no trade is the only equilibrium outcome. We study extreme adverse selection via the limit behavior of a financial market as the support of private information converges to an...

We propose a formal model of scientific modeling, geared to applications of decision theory and game theory. The model highlights the freedom that modelers have in conceptualizing social phenomena using general paradigms in these fields. It may shed some light on the distinctions between (i)...

We examine a repeated interaction between an agent, who undertakes experiments, and a principal who provides the requisite funding for these experiments. The repeated interaction gives rise to a dynamic agency cost—the more lucrative is the agent’s stream of future rents following a failure,...

Different markets are cleared by different types of prices -- seller-specific prices that are uniform across buyers in some markets, and personalized prices tailored to the buyer in others. We examine a setting in which buyers and sellers make investments before matching in a competitive market....