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Related papers: The Optimal Sample Complexity of Linear Contracts

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We study the optimal sample complexity in large-scale Reinforcement Learning (RL) problems with policy space generalization, i.e. the agent has a prior knowledge that the optimal policy lies in a known policy space. Existing results show…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-08-18 Wenlong Mou , Zheng Wen , Xi Chen

Robust optimization provides a principled and unified framework to model many problems in modern operations research and computer science applications, such as risk measures minimization and adversarially robust machine learning. To use a…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-10-04 Hao Hao , Peter Zhang

It has been repeatedly stated that maximum likelihood (ML) estimates of exponents of power-law distributions can only be reliably obtained for exponents smaller than minus one. The main argument that power laws are otherwise not…

Data Analysis, Statistics and Probability · Physics 2017-04-12 Rudolf Hanel , Bernat Corominas-Murtra , Bo Liu , Stefan Thurner

Motivated by the need to efficiently identify multiple candidates in high trial-and-error cost tasks such as drug discovery, we propose a near-optimal algorithm to identify all {\epsilon}-best arms (i.e., those at most {\epsilon} worse than…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2025-10-02 Zhekai Li , Tianyi Ma , Cheng Hua , Ruihao Zhu

We study the problem of designing optimal learning and decision-making formulations when only historical data is available. Prior work typically commits to a particular class of data-driven formulation and subsequently tries to establish…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2024-03-13 Amine Bennouna , Bart P. G. Van Parys

In this paper we show how the relaxation techniques can be used to establish the existence of an optimal contract in presence of information asymmetry. The method we illustrate was initially motivated by the problem of designing optimal…

Mathematical Finance · Quantitative Finance 2023-07-17 Guillermo Alonso Alvarez , Sergey Nadtochiy

Selecting an optimal set of exemplars is critical for good performance of in-context learning. However, prior exemplar search methods narrowly optimize for predictive accuracy, critically neglecting model calibration--a key determinant of…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-10-02 Gaoxiang Luo , Aryan Deshwal

In continuous-choice settings, consumers decide not only on whether to purchase a product, but also on how much to purchase. Thus, firms optimize a full price schedule rather than a single price point. This paper provides a methodology to…

General Economics · Economics 2024-08-13 Soheil Ghili , Russ Yoon

We consider the problem of constructing probabilistic predictions that lead to accurate decisions when employed by downstream users to inform actions. For a single decision maker, designing an optimal predictor is equivalent to minimizing a…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-10-15 Isaac Gibbs , Ryan J. Tibshirani

We consider ordinal approximation algorithms for a broad class of utility maximization problems for multi-agent systems. In these problems, agents have utilities for connecting to each other, and the goal is to compute a maximum-utility…

Multiagent Systems · Computer Science 2017-11-30 Ben Abramowitz , Elliot Anshelevich

This paper introduces the targeted sampling model in optimal auction design. In this model, the seller may specify a quantile interval and sample from a buyer's prior restricted to the interval. This can be interpreted as allowing the…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2021-05-12 Yihang Hu , Zhiyi Huang , Yiheng Shen , Xiangning Wang

We consider a simulation optimization problem for a context-dependent decision-making, which aims to determine the top-m designs for all contexts. Under a Bayesian framework, we formulate the optimal dynamic sampling decision as a…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2023-06-12 Gongbo Zhang , Sihua Chen , Kuihua Huang , Yijie Peng

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…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-02-04 Natalie Collina , Surbhi Goel , Aaron Roth , Emily Ryu , Mirah Shi

The challenge of identifying the best feasible arm within a fixed budget has attracted considerable interest in recent years. However, a notable gap remains in the literature: the exact exponential rate at which the error probability…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-06-04 Jie Bian , Vincent Y. F. Tan

This paper proposes a method to design an optimal dynamic contract between a principal and an agent, who has the authority to control both the principal's revenue and an engineered system. The key characteristic of our problem setting is…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2014-03-24 Insoon Yang , Duncan S. Callaway , Claire J. Tomlin

A primary goal of online deliberation platforms is to identify ideas that are broadly agreeable to a community of users through their expressed preferences. Yet, consensus elicitation should ideally extend beyond the specific statements…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-04-24 Carter Blair , Ben Armstrong , Shiri Alouf-Heffetz , Nimrod Talmon , Davide Grossi

We study how to utilize (possibly erroneous) predictions in a model for computing under uncertainty in which an algorithm can query unknown data. Our aim is to minimize the number of queries needed to solve the minimum spanning tree…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2022-07-01 Thomas Erlebach , Murilo Santos de Lima , Nicole Megow , Jens Schlöter

We consider a revenue maximization model, in which a company aims at designing a menu of contracts, given a population of customers. A standard approach consists in constructing an incentive-compatible continuum of contracts, i.e., a menu…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2023-03-31 Quentin Jacquet , Wim van Ackooij , Clémence Alasseur , Stéphane Gaubert

Online optimization problems arise in many resource allocation tasks, where the future demands for each resource and the associated utility functions change over time and are not known apriori, yet resources need to be allocated at every…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2015-02-06 Reza Eghbali , Jon Swenson , Maryam Fazel

In this paper, we study a general online linear programming problem whose formulation encompasses many practical dynamic resource allocation problems, including internet advertising display applications, revenue management, various routing,…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2015-03-20 Patrick Jaillet , Xin Lu