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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

2005

Economics

Yale University

Robustness

Articles 1 - 4 of 4

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Robust Monopoly Pricing, Dirk Bergemann, Karl Schlag Jul 2005

Robust Monopoly Pricing, Dirk Bergemann, Karl Schlag

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

We consider a robust version of the classic problem of optimal monopoly pricing with incomplete information. In the robust version, the seller faces model uncertainty and only knows that the true demand distribution is in the neighborhood of a given model distribution. We characterize the optimal pricing policy under two distinct, but related, decision criteria with multiple priors: (i) maximin expected utility and (ii) minimax expected regret. The resulting optimal pricing policy under either criterion yields a robust policy to the model uncertainty. While the classic monopoly policy and the maximin criterion yield a single deterministic price, minimax regret always …


Robust Monopoly Pricing: The Case Of Regret, Dirk Bergemann, Karl Schlag Jul 2005

Robust Monopoly Pricing: The Case Of Regret, Dirk Bergemann, Karl Schlag

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

We consider a robust version of the classic problem of optimal monopoly pricing with incomplete information. The robust version of the problem is distinct in two aspects: (i) the seller minimizes regret rather than maximizes revenue, and (ii) the seller only knows that the true distribution of the valuations is in a neighborhood of a given model distribution. We characterize the robust pricing policy as the solution to a minimax problem for small and large neighborhoods. In contrast to the classic monopoly policy, which is a single deterministic price, the robust policy is always a random pricing policy, or equivalently, …


Robust Monopoly Pricing, Dirk Bergemann, Karl Schlag Jul 2005

Robust Monopoly Pricing, Dirk Bergemann, Karl Schlag

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

We consider a robust version of the classic problem of optimal monopoly pricing with incomplete information. In the robust version of the problem the seller only knows that demand will be in a neighborhood of a given model distribution. We characterize the optimal pricing policy under two distinct, but related, decision criteria with multiple priors: (i) maximin expected utility and (ii) minimax expected regret. While the classic monopoly policy and the maximin criterion yield a single deterministic price, minimax regret always prescribes a random pricing policy, or equivalently, a multi-item menu policy. The resulting optimal pricing policy under either criterion …


Robust Implementation: The Role Of Large Type Spaces, Dirk Bergemann, Stephen Morris Jun 2005

Robust Implementation: The Role Of Large Type Spaces, Dirk Bergemann, Stephen Morris

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

A social choice function is robustly implemented if every equilibrium on every type space achieves outcomes consistent with a social choice function. We identify a robust monotonicity condition that is necessary and (with mild extra assumptions) sufficient for robust implementation. Robust monotonicity is strictly stronger than both Maskin monotonicity (necessary and almost sufficient for complete information implementation) and ex post monotonicity (necessary and almost sufficient for ex post implementation). It is equivalent to Bayesian monotonicity on all type spaces. It requires that there not be too much interdependence of types. We characterize robust monotonicity for some interesting economic environments. We …