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Information acquisition and voting with heterogeneous experts

Author

Listed:
  • Xu Tan
  • Quan Wen

Abstract

A social planner selects heterogeneously biased experts to (either sequentially or simultaneously) acquire costly signals, and then agents vote between two alternatives. To maximize social welfare, the social planner adopts an alternating mechanism—choosing extremely biased experts whose preferences oppose the pivotal voter's current preference—in the optimal sequential mechanism, whereas she chooses mildly biased experts in the optimal simultaneous mechanism. Despite the flexibility of a sequential mechanism, the optimal simultaneous mechanism can achieve strictly higher social welfare when information cost is low. Supermajority rules can dominate simple majority rule in terms of both information acquisition and social welfare.

Suggested Citation

  • Xu Tan & Quan Wen, 2020. "Information acquisition and voting with heterogeneous experts," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 51(4), pages 1063-1092, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:randje:v:51:y:2020:i:4:p:1063-1092
    DOI: 10.1111/1756-2171.12350
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    References listed on IDEAS

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