Heterogenous Human Capital: Life Cycle Investment in Health and Education

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An Axiomatic Model of Social Adaptive Behavior.

I replace the assumption that an agent makes an optimal choice by an assumption that the agent executes a computational algorithm directed at finding a choice that is good at the time the choice is made. The algorithm utilizes the individual's own information, and information about choices of other members of society. It is shown that under some regularity conditions any such algorithm can be decomposed into generalized gradient dynamics, direct imitation, experimentation, and imitation of scope.BEHAVIOUR ; INFORMATION ; ECONOMIC MODELS

Bounded Rationality:Static Versus Dynamic Approaches

Two kinds of theories of boundedly rational behavior are possible. Static theories focus on stationary behavior and do not include any explicit mechanism for temporal change. Dynamic theories, on the other hand, explicitly model the fine-grain adjustments made by the subjects in response to their recent experiences. The main contribution of this paper is to argue that the restrictions usually imposed on the distribution of choices in the static approach are generically not supported by a dynamic adjustment mechanism. The genericity here is understood both in the measure theoretic and in the topological sense.

Why Do Social Skills Matter?

In this paper I propose a model where social skills of a manager signal the workers that their e¤ort is productive. In this model …rms with a high productivity of e¤ort hire a socially skilled manager and pay higher wages, and workers hired by these …rms exert higher e¤ort. In a broader context, the paper argues the employees are compensated with a higher wage and better working conditions for higher levels of effort.

Quality Gaps

In this paper I consider a monopolistic screening model with continuum of types when the type set is a disconnected subset of the real line. I prove that the product line remains connected provided that the gap in the type space is sufficiently small. I also use the results to show that the inverse screening problem may be ill-defined.screening, product line, quality gap

Lie Groups of Partial Differential Equations and Their Application to the Multidimensional Screening Problems

In this paper I describe group theoretic methods that can be used for analyzing the boundary problems, which arise when the Hamiltonian method is applied to solve the relaxed problem for the multidimensional screening problem. This technique can provide some useful insights into the structure of solutions and some times may help to arrive at particular solutionsLie group, multidimensional screening

Incentives for Boundedly Rational Agents.

This paper develops a theoretical framework for analyzing incentive schemes under bounded rationality. It starts from a standard principal-agent model and then superimposes an assumption of boundedly rational behavior on the part of the agent. Boundedly rational behavior is modeled as an explicit optimization procedure which combines gradient dynamics with a specific form of social learning called imitation of scope.RATIONALITY ; ECONOMIC MODELS ; BEHAVIOUR

A Noisy Model of Individual Behaviour.

This paper develops a model of individual adjustment subject to mistakes. In this case when mistakes are assumed i.i.d., this process produces a probability distribution of agents decision whose evolution is determined by Fokker-Planck equation. This distribution converges to the unique, globally stable stationary distribution. In the case when choice space is one dimensional this distribution satisfies Independence of Irrelevant Alternatives (IIA) property. In multidimensional case for IIA to hold strong additional conditions on payoff function or error structure should be satisfied. The paper also considers generalization of model for autocorrelated errors in one-dimensional case.WAGES ; DISTRIBUTION ; BEHAVIOUR

Equilibrium selection in coordination games: Why do dominated strategies matter?

In this paper I illustrate by an example that strictly dominated strategies may affect the process of the equilibrium selection in coordination games. The strategy profile that gets selected may be both Pareto and risk dominated. This distinguishes it from the examples provided in Ellison (2000) and Maruta (1997).