Consider a mechanism design setting in which agents acquire costly information about an unknown, payoff-relevant state of nature. Information gathering is covert and the agents’ information is correlated. We investigate conditions under which (i) efficiency and (ii) full surplus extraction are Bayesian incentive compatible and interim individually rational. JEL Classification: D44, D82

This paper contributes to the micro-foundation of money in centralized markets with idiosyncratic uncertainty. It shows existence of stationary monetary equilibria and ensures that there is an optimum quantity of money. The rational solution of our model is compared with actual behavior in a laboratory experiment. The experiment gives support to the theoretical approach. JEL classification: C73...

A database of individual forecasters' exchange rate predictions is analyzed. We demonstrate that only a small minority can be classed as rational, that most forecasts are inferior to easily available alternatives, and that relatively good performance in one period is not a reliable indicator of relatively good performance in subsequent periods. JEL Classification Number: F31

The subjective framework for reasoning is extended to incorporate the representation of unawareness in games. Both unawareness of actions and decision makers are modeled as well as reasoning about others’ unawareness. It is shown that a small grain of uncertainty about unawareness with rational decision makers can lead to cooperation in the finitely repeated prisoner’s dilemma. JEL Classificati...

The ‘rational addiction’ model of cigarette smoking downplays the influence of social factors and biological dependency. This paper develops a simple model of these factors and presents some causality tests that indicate that nicotine content ‘causes’ smoking with the direction being negative. ©2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. JEL classification: D12; J12