Related papers: Non-quasi-linear Agents in Quasi-linear Mechanisms
We investigate approximately optimal mechanisms in settings where bidders' utility functions are non-linear; specifically, convex, with respect to payments (such settings arise, for instance, in procurement auctions for energy). We provide…
We study the price of anarchy of mechanisms in the presence of risk-averse agents. Previous work has focused on agents with quasilinear utilities, possibly with a budget. Our model subsumes this as a special case but also captures that…
Modelling agent preferences has applications in a range of fields including economics and increasingly, artificial intelligence. These preferences are not always known and thus may need to be estimated from observed behavior, in which case…
This paper studies a class of network games with linear-quadratic payoffs and externalities exerted through a strictly concave interaction function. This class of game is motivated by the diminishing marginal effects with peer influences.…
We show that economic conclusions derived from Bulow and Roberts (1989) for linear utility models approximately extend to non-linear utility models. Specifically, we quantify the extent to which agents with non-linear utilities resemble…
Many economic transactions, including those of online markets, have a time lag between the start and end times of transactions. Customers need to wait for completion of their transaction (order fulfillment) and hence are also interested in…
In quasi-proportional auctions, each bidder receives a fraction of the allocation equal to the weight of their bid divided by the sum of weights of all bids, where each bid's weight is determined by a weight function. We study the…
In the study of reactive systems, qualitative properties are usually easier to model and analyze than quantitative properties. This is especially true in systems where mutually beneficial cooperation between agents is possible, such as…
Two sellers compete to sell identical products to a single buyer. Each seller chooses an arbitrary mechanism, possibly involving lotteries, to sell their product. The utility-maximizing buyer can choose to participate in one or both…
This paper presents a multi-agent reinforcement learning algorithm to represent strategic bidding behavior in freight transport markets. Using this algorithm, we investigate whether feasible market equilibriums arise without any central…
Aligning AI systems with human values remains a fundamental challenge, but does our inability to create perfectly aligned models preclude obtaining the benefits of alignment? We study a strategic setting where a human user interacts with…
We describe a two-stage mechanism that fully implements the set of efficient outcomes in two-agent environments with quasi-linear utilities. The mechanism asks one agent to set prices for each outcome, and the other agent to make a choice,…
Inspired by Internet ad auction applications, we study the problem of allocating a single item via an auction when bidders place very different values on the item. We formulate this as the problem of prior-free auction and focus on…
We consider repeated allocation of a shared resource via a non-monetary mechanism, wherein a single item must be allocated to one of multiple agents in each round. We assume that each agent has i.i.d. values for the item across rounds, and…
We apply control theoretic and optimization techniques to adaptively design incentives. In particular, we consider the problem of a planner with an objective that depends on data from strategic decision makers. The planner does not know the…
Social utility maximization refers to the process of allocating resources in such a way that the sum of agents' utilities is maximized under the system constraints. Such allocation arises in several problems in the general area of…
The introduction of aggregator structures has proven effective in bringing fairness to energy resource allocation by negotiating for more resources and economic surplus on behalf of users. This paper extends the fair energy resource…
The overall aim of our research is to develop techniques to reason about the equilibrium properties of multi-agent systems. We model multi-agent systems as concurrent games, in which each player is a process that is assumed to act…
An indivisible object may be sold to one of $n$ agents who know their valuations of the object. The seller would like to use a revenue-maximizing mechanism but her knowledge of the valuations' distribution is scarce: she knows only the…
Power system operators and electric utility companies often impose a coincident peak demand charge on customers when the aggregate system demand reaches its maximum. This charge incentivizes customers to strategically shift their peak usage…