IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jetheo/v141y2008i1p114-133.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An efficient solution to the informed principal problem

Author

Listed:
  • Severinov, Sergei

Abstract

In this paper I study mechanism design by an informed principal. I show that generically this problem has an ex-post efficient solution. In the equilibrium mechanism, the informed principal appropriates all expected social surplus, with each type of her getting all expected social surplus conditional on that type. This outcome is supported as a perfect sequential equilibrium of the informed principal game when the joint probability distribution from which the agents' types are drawn satisfies two conditions: the well-known condition of Cremer and McLean and Identifiability condition introduced by Kosenok and Severinov [Individually rational, budget-balanced mechanisms and allocation of surplus, J. Econ. Theory (2002), forthcoming]. Conversely, these conditions are necessary for an ex-post efficient outcome to be attainable in an equilibrium of the informed principal game. Under these conditions only our equilibrium outcome constitutes a neutral optimum, i.e. cannot be eliminated by any reasonable concept of blocking [R. Myerson, Mechanism design by an informed principal, Econometrica 51 (1983) 1767-1797]. Identifiability and Cremer-McLean conditions are generic when there are at least three agents, and none of them has more types than the number of type profiles of the other agents.

Suggested Citation

  • Severinov, Sergei, 2008. "An efficient solution to the informed principal problem," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 141(1), pages 114-133, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jetheo:v:141:y:2008:i:1:p:114-133
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022-0531(07)00141-X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Kreps, David M & Wilson, Robert, 1982. "Sequential Equilibria," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(4), pages 863-894, July.
    2. Grossman, Sanford J. & Perry, Motty, 1986. "Perfect sequential equilibrium," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 97-119, June.
    3. Myerson, Roger B, 1983. "Mechanism Design by an Informed Principal," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 51(6), pages 1767-1797, November.
    4. Farrell Joseph, 1993. "Meaning and Credibility in Cheap-Talk Games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 5(4), pages 514-531, October.
    5. McAfee, R Preston & Reny, Philip J, 1992. "Correlated Information and Mechanism Design," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 60(2), pages 395-421, March.
    6. Maskin, Eric & Tirole, Jean, 1992. "The Principal-Agent Relationship with an Informed Principal, II: Common Values," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 60(1), pages 1-42, January.
    7. Cremer, Jacques & McLean, Richard P, 1985. "Optimal Selling Strategies under Uncertainty for a Discriminating Monopolist When Demands Are Interdependent," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 53(2), pages 345-361, March.
    8. Cremer, Jacques & McLean, Richard P, 1988. "Full Extraction of the Surplus in Bayesian and Dominant Strategy Auctions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 56(6), pages 1247-1257, November.
    9. Yilankaya, Okan, 1999. "A Note on the Seller's Optimal Mechanism in Bilateral Trade with Two-Sided Incomplete Information," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 267-271, July.
    10. Maskin, Eric & Tirole, Jean, 1990. "The Principal-Agent Relationship with an Informed Principal: The Case of Private Values," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 58(2), pages 379-409, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mylovanov, Tymofiy & Tröger, Thomas, 2008. "Optimal Auction Design and Irrelevance of Private Information," Bonn Econ Discussion Papers 21/2008, University of Bonn, Bonn Graduate School of Economics (BGSE).
    2. Anastasios Dosis, 2022. "On the informed principal model with common values," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 53(4), pages 792-825, December.
    3. Mostafa Beshkar & Jee‐Hyeong Park, 2021. "Dispute Settlement With Second‐Order Uncertainty," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 62(4), pages 1433-1452, November.
    4. Manitra A. Rakotoarisoa, 2016. "Trade with Endogenous Market Power Under Asymmetric and Incomplete Information," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 16(4), pages 423-440, December.
    5. Takeshi Nishimura, 2019. "Informed Principal Problems in Bilateral Trading," Papers 1906.10311, arXiv.org, revised Feb 2022.
    6. Eric van Damme & Xu Lang, 2022. "Two-Person Bargaining when the Disagreement Point is Private Information," Papers 2211.06830, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2024.
    7. Jeremy Bertomeu & Davide Cianciaruso, 2018. "Verifiable disclosure," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 65(4), pages 1011-1044, June.
    8. Thomas Troeger & Tymofiy Mylovanov, 2010. "Optimal Auction Design and Irrelevance of Privacy of Information," 2010 Meeting Papers 1039, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    9. Rachmilevitch, Shiran, 2015. "Bribing in second-price auctions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 191-205.
    10. Nishimura, Takeshi, 2022. "Informed principal problems in bilateral trading," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 204(C).
    11. Wagner, Christoph & Mylovanov, Tymofiy & Tröger, Thomas, 2015. "Informed-principal problem with moral hazard, risk neutrality, and no limited liability," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 159(PA), pages 280-289.
    12. Davoodalhosseini, Seyed Mohammadreza, 2019. "Constrained efficiency with adverse selection and directed search," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 568-593.
    13. Xin Zhao, 2023. "Auction design by an informed seller: A foundation of reserve price signalling," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 56(3), pages 1161-1190, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lucia Quesada, 2003. "Modeling collusion as an informed principal problem," Game Theory and Information 0304002, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Cella, Michela, 2008. "Informed principal with correlation," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 433-456, November.
    3. Okada, Akira, 2016. "A non-cooperative bargaining theory with incomplete information: Verifiable types," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 163(C), pages 318-341.
    4. Nishimura, Takeshi, 2022. "Informed principal problems in bilateral trading," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 204(C).
    5. Vasiliki Skreta, 2011. "On the informed seller problem: optimal information disclosure," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 15(1), pages 1-36, March.
    6. Cella, Michela, 2008. "Informed principal with correlation," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 433-456, November.
    7. Sergei Severinov & Grigory Kosenok, 2004. "Individually Rational, Balanced-Budget Bayesian Mechanisms and the," 2004 Meeting Papers 633, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    8. Marco Ottaviani & Andrea Prat, 2001. "The Value of Public Information in Monopoly," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(6), pages 1673-1683, November.
    9. Mylovanov, Timofiy & Troger, Thomas E., 2012. "Informed principal problems in generalized private values environments," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 7(3), September.
    10. Li, Yunan & Zhang, Xingtan, 2024. "Collective decision through an informed mediator," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 218(C).
    11. Charles Z. Zheng, 2016. "Goethe's secret reserve price," International Journal of Economic Theory, The International Society for Economic Theory, vol. 12(1), pages 41-48, March.
    12. Eduardo Perez-Richet, 2014. "Interim Bayesian Persuasion: First Steps," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(5), pages 469-474, May.
    13. Takeshi Nishimura, 2019. "Informed Principal Problems in Bilateral Trading," Papers 1906.10311, arXiv.org, revised Feb 2022.
    14. Bedard, Nicholas C., 2017. "The strategically ignorant principal," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 548-561.
    15. Cramton Peter C. & Palfrey Thomas R., 1995. "Ratifiable Mechanisms: Learning from Disagreement," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 255-283, August.
    16. Koessler, Frédéric & Skreta, Vasiliki, 2016. "Informed seller with taste heterogeneity," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 456-471.
    17. Anastasios Dosis, 2022. "On the informed principal model with common values," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 53(4), pages 792-825, December.
    18. Michela CELLA, 2007. "Informed principal with correlation," Departmental Working Papers 2007-11, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.
    19. Tan, Guofu & Yilankaya, Okan, 2007. "Ratifiability of efficient collusive mechanisms in second-price auctions with participation costs," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 59(2), pages 383-396, May.
    20. de Clippel, Geoffroy & Minelli, Enrico, 2004. "Two-person bargaining with verifiable information," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(7), pages 799-813, November.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jetheo:v:141:y:2008:i:1:p:114-133. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622869 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.