"Position uncertainty in a sequential public goods game: an experiment" with Konstantinos Georgalos

1. • Under Review | [arXiv] [Pre-registration]

   • Abstract.   Gallice and Monzón (2019) present a natural environment that sustains full co-operation in one-shot social dilemmas among a finite number of self-interested agents. They demonstrate that in a sequential public goods game, where agents lack knowledge of their position in the sequence but can observe some predecessors' actions, full contribution emerges in equilibrium due to agents' incentive to induce potential successors to follow suit. In this study, we aim to test the theoretical predictions of this model through an economic experiment. We conducted three treatments, varying the amount of information about past actions that a subject can observe, as well as their positional awareness. Through rigorous structural econometric analysis, we found that approximately 25% of the subjects behaved in line with the theoretical predictions. However, we also observed the presence of alternative behavioural types among the remaining subjects. The majority were classified as conditional co-operators, showing a willingness to cooperate based on others' actions. Some subjects exhibited altruistic tendencies, while only a small minority engaged in free-riding behaviour.

"Efficient Public Good Provision in a Multipolar World" with Jorge Bruno, Renaud Foucart and Sonali SenGupta

1. • Submitted | [PDF] [arXiv] 

   • Abstract. We model a public goods game with groups, position uncertainty, and observational learning. Contributions are simultaneous within groups, but groups play sequentially based on their observation of an incomplete sample of past contributions. We show that full cooperation between and within groups is possible with self-interested players on a fixed horizon. Position uncertainty implies the existence of an equilibrium where groups of players conditionally cooperate in the hope of influencing further groups. Conditional cooperation implies that each group member is pivotal, so that efficient simultaneous provision within groups is an equilibrium.

   • Previously circulated as "A Group Public Goods Game with Position Uncertainty".

"Public Good Provision with a Distributor" with Alexander Matros and Sonali SenGupta  

1. • [PDF] [arXiv] [SSRN]

   • Abstract. We present a model of public good provision with a distributor. Our main result describes a symmetric mixed-strategy equilibrium, where all agents contribute to a common fund with probability p and the distributor provides either a particular amount of public goods or nothing. A corollary of this finding is the efficient public good provision equilibrium where all agents contribute to the common fund, all agents are expected to contribute, and the distributor spends the entire common fund for the public good provision.

"Pricing and EV charging equilibria" with Jorge Bruno, Trivikram Dokka, and Sonali SenGupta

1. • New Version Coming Soon!

   • Previous Version | [PDF] [arXiv] [SSRN]

   • Abstract. We study equilibria in an Electric Vehicle (EV) charging game, a cost minimization game inherent to decentralized charging control strategy for EV power demand management. In our model, each user optimizes its total cost which is sum of direct power cost and the indirect dissatisfaction cost. We show that taking player specific price independent dissatisfaction cost in to account, contrary to popular belief, herding only happens at lower EV uptake. Moreover, this is true for both linear and logistic dissatisfaction functions. We study the question of existence of price profiles to induce a desired equilibrium. We define two types of equilibria, distributed and non-distributed equilibria, and show that under logistic dissatisfaction, only non-distributed equilibria are possible by feasibly setting prices. In linear case, both type of equilibria are possible but price discrimination is necessary to induce distributed equilibria. Finally, we show that in the case of symmetric EV users, mediation cannot improve upon Nash equilibria.

"Tax Evasion, Embezzlement and Public Good Provision" with Alexander Matros and Sonali SenGupta 

"Data-driven online scheduling of EV home charging" with Trivikram Dokka and Amin Yarahmadi [Status : Draft coming soon]

"Stronger bounds for effort and welfare maximizing equilibria in network public good games" with  Jorge Bruno, Trivikram Dokka, and Sonali SenGupta