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On the Foundations of Ex Post Incentive-Compatible Mechanisms

Author

Listed:
  • Takuro Yamashita
  • Shuguang Zhu

Abstract

This paper considers an interdependent-value robust mechanism design problem, where the principal has little knowledge about the agent's belief. Although ex post incentive-compatible (EPIC) mechanisms can implement allocations without any knowledge about the agent's belief, we show that, under a certain condition (order-reversing interdependence), there exists a non-EPIC mechanism that achieves a strictly higher expected revenue than any EPIC mechanism given whatever (admissible) belief structure the agent may enjoy. Conversely, with sufficiently small interdependence, such a non-EPIC mechanism does not exist: for some (admissible) belief structure, an EPIC mechanism achieves the highest expected revenue.

Suggested Citation

  • Takuro Yamashita & Shuguang Zhu, 2022. "On the Foundations of Ex Post Incentive-Compatible Mechanisms," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 494-514, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aejmic:v:14:y:2022:i:4:p:494-514
    DOI: 10.1257/mic.20200174
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    Cited by:

    1. Mukherjee, Saptarshi & Muto, Nozomu & Sen, Arunava, 2024. "Implementation in undominated strategies with applications to auction design, public good provision and matching," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 216(C).
    2. Satoshi Nakada & Shmuel Nitzan & Takashi Ui, 2025. "Robust Voting under Uncertainty," Papers 2507.22655, arXiv.org.
    3. repec:upd:utmpwp:038 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Wanchang Zhang, 2022. "Robust Private Supply of a Public Good," Papers 2201.00923, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2022.
    5. Pham, Hien & Yamashita, Takuro, 2024. "Auction design with heterogeneous priors," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 413-425.
    6. Tilman Börgers, 2017. "(No) Foundations of dominant-strategy mechanisms: a comment on Chung and Ely (2007)," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 21(2), pages 73-82, June.
    7. Wanchang Zhang, 2021. "Random Double Auction: A Robust Bilateral Trading Mechanism," Papers 2105.05427, arXiv.org, revised May 2022.
    8. Tilman Börgers & Jiangtao Li, 2019. "Strategically Simple Mechanisms," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(6), pages 2003-2035, November.
    9. Barberà, Salvador & Berga, Dolors & Moreno, Bernardo, 2022. "Restricted environments and incentive compatibility in interdependent values models," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 1-28.
    10. Wei He & Jiangtao Li & Weijie Zhong, 2024. "Rank-Guaranteed Auctions," Papers 2408.12001, arXiv.org.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness

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