This book is a non-technical introduction to auction theory; its practical application in auction design (including many examples); and its uses in other parts of economics. It can be used for a graduate course on auction theory, or – by picking selectively – an advanced...

We usually assume increases in supply, allocation by rationing, and exclusion of potential buyers will never raise prices. But all of these activities raise the expected price in an important set of cases when common-value assets are sold. Furthermore, when we make the assumptions needed to rule...

None available

This paper, forthcoming in Journal of Economic Surveys, provides an elementary, non-technical, survey of auction theory, by introducing and describing some of the critical papers in the subject. (The most important of these are reproduced in a companion book, The Economic Theory of Auctions,...

We use a classroom game, the Wallet Game, to show that slight asymmetries between bidders can have very large effects on prices in standard ascending (i.e. English) auctions of common-values objects. Examples of small asymmetries are a small value advantage for one bidder or a small ownership of...

This is a preliminary draft of an Invited Symposium paper for the World Congress of the Econometric Society to be held in Seattle in August 2000. We discuss the strong connections between auction theory and standard economic theory, and argue that auction-theoretic tools and intuitions can...

We use a classroom game, the ‘Wallet Game’, to show that in standard ascending, i.e. English, auctions of close-to-common-values objects, even slight asymmetries between bidders can have very large effects on prices. Examples of small asymmetries are a small value advantage for one bidder or...

This is a preliminary draft of an Invited Symposium paper for the World Congress of the Econometric Society to be held in Seattle in August 2000. We discuss the strong connections between auction theory and 'standard' economic theory, and argue that auction-theoretic tools and intuitions can...

Economic theory is often abused in practical policy-making. There is frequently excessive focus on sophisticated theory at the expense of elementary theory; too much economic knowledge can sometimes be a dangerous thing. Too little attention is paid to the wider economic context, and to the...

We usually assume increases in supply, allocation by rationing, and exclusion of potential buyers will never raise prices. But all of these activities raise the expected price in an important set of cases when common-value assets are sold. Furthermore, when we make the assumptions needed to rule...