English
Related papers

Related papers: Capacity Constraints in Principal-Agent Problems

200 papers

We present a continuous-time contract whereby a top-level player can incentivize a hierarchy of players below him to act in his best interest despite only observing the output of his direct subordinate. This paper extends Sannikov's…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2015-11-25 Christopher W. Miller , Insoon Yang

Combinatorial optimization problems involving multiple agents are notoriously challenging due to their NP-hard nature and the necessity for effective agent coordination. Despite advancements in learning-based methods, existing approaches…

Multiagent Systems · Computer Science 2025-10-23 Federico Berto , Chuanbo Hua , Laurin Luttmann , Jiwoo Son , Junyoung Park , Kyuree Ahn , Changhyun Kwon , Lin Xie , Jinkyoo Park

We introduce and study a computational version of the principal-agent problem -- a classic problem in Economics that arises when a principal desires to contract an agent to carry out some task, but has incomplete information about the agent…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2023-05-18 David Hyland , Julian Gutierrez , Michael Wooldridge

Model checking strategic abilities was successfully developed and applied since the early 2000s to ensure properties in Multi-Agent System. In this paper, we introduce the notion of capacities giving different abilities to an agent. This…

Multiagent Systems · Computer Science 2023-08-23 Gabriel Ballot , Vadim Malvone , Jean Leneutre , Youssef Laarouchi

We analyze the optimal delegation problem between a principal and an agent, assuming that the latter has state-independent preferences. We demonstrate that if the principal is more risk-averse than the agent toward non-status quo options,…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2024-09-19 Xiaoxiao Hu , Haoran Lei

We investigate the probabilistic feasibility of randomized solutions to two distinct classes of uncertain multi-agent optimization programs. We first assume that only the constraints of the program are affected by uncertainty, while the…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2020-09-29 George Pantazis , Filiberto Fele , Kostas Margellos

Self-modification of agents embedded in complex environments is hard to avoid, whether it happens via direct means (e.g. own code modification) or indirectly (e.g. influencing the operator, exploiting bugs or the environment). It has been…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2021-01-19 Jakub Tětek , Marek Sklenka , Tomáš Gavenčiak

A principal can restrict an agent's information (the persuasion problem) or restrict an agent's discretion (the delegation problem). We show that these problems are generally equivalent - solving one solves the other. We use tools from the…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2019-02-08 Anton Kolotilin , Andriy Zapechelnyuk

Remarkable performance of large language models (LLMs) in a variety of tasks brings forth many opportunities as well as challenges of utilizing them in production settings. Towards practical adoption of LLMs, multi-agent systems hold great…

Computation and Language · Computer Science 2024-02-05 Pouya Pezeshkpour , Eser Kandogan , Nikita Bhutani , Sajjadur Rahman , Tom Mitchell , Estevam Hruschka

The existence of optimal contracts of the principal-agent problem is a long-standing problem. According to the general framework in Cvitani\'c et al. [2], this existence can be derived from the existence of a classical solution to a…

Mathematical Finance · Quantitative Finance 2025-03-19 Xinfu Chen , Shuaijie Qian , Guan Qiao

We introduce capital flow constraints, loss of good will and loan to the lot sizing problem. Capital flow constraint is different from traditional capacity constraints: when a manufacturer launches production, its present capital should not…

Computational Engineering, Finance, and Science · Computer Science 2019-12-18 Zhen Chen , Ren-qian Zhang

Targeted marketing policies target different customers with different marketing actions. While most research has focused on training targeting policies without managerial constraints, in practice, many firms face managerial constraints when…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2023-12-20 Haihao Lu , Duncan Simester , Yuting Zhu

We study linear contracts for combinatorial problems in multi-agent settings. In this problem, a principal designs a linear contract with several agents, each of whom can decide to take a costly action or not. The principal observes only…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-12-19 Kanstantsin Pashkovich , Jacob Skitsko

Many real-life contractual relations differ completely from the clean, static model at the heart of principal-agent theory. Typically, they involve repeated strategic interactions of the principal and agent, taking place under uncertainty…

Inactive constraints do not contribute to the solution of an optimal control problem, but increase the problem size and burden the numerical computations. We present a novel strategy for handling inactive constraints efficiently by…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2021-12-16 Yuanbo Nie , Eric C. Kerrigan

We study a natural combinatorial single-principal multi-agent contract design problem, in which a principal motivates a team of agents to exert effort toward a given task. At the heart of our model is a reward function, which maps the agent…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2026-03-04 Paul Duetting , Tomer Ezra , Michal Feldman , Thomas Kesselheim

This paper studies a general class of social choice problems in which agents' payoff functions (or types) are privately observable random variables, and monetary transfers are not available. We consider cardinal social choice functions…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2024-08-20 Kazuya Kikuchi , Yukio Koriyama

We study treatment assignment problems under capacity constraints, where a planner aims to maximize social welfare by assigning treatments based on observable covariates. Such constraints, common when treatments are costly or limited in…

Econometrics · Economics 2025-09-12 Keita Sunada , Kohei Izumi

We consider cooperative multi-agent consensus optimization problems over both static and time-varying communication networks, where only local communications are allowed. The objective is to minimize the sum of agent-specific possibly…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2017-06-27 Erfan Yazdandoost Hamedani , Necdet Serhat Aybat

We consider the problem of reserving link capacity in a network in such a way that any of a given set of flow scenarios can be supported. In the optimal capacity reservation problem, we choose the reserved link capacities to minimize the…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2017-05-03 Nicholas Moehle , Xinyue Shen , Zhi-Quan Luo , Stephen Boyd