Incentives

This book examines incentives at work to see how and how well coordination is achieved by informing and motivating individual decision makers. Considering the performance of agents, institutions, and a wide range of market transactions, it uses worked examples and lucid general theory in its analysis.

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When incentives work well, individuals prosper. When incentives are poor, the pursuit of self-interest is self-defeating. This book is wholly devoted to the topical subject of incentives from individual, collective, and institutional standpoints. This third edition is fully updated and expanded, including a new section on the 2007–08 financial crisis and a new chapter on networks as well as specific applications of school placement for students, search engine ad auctions, pollution permits, and more. Using worked examples and lucid general theory in its analysis, and seasoned with references to current and past events, Incentives: Motivation and the Economics of Information examines: the performance of agents hired to carry out specific tasks, from taxi drivers to CEOs; the performance of institutions, from voting schemes to medical panels deciding who gets kidney transplants; a wide range of market transactions, from auctions to labor markets to the entire economy. Suitable for advanced undergraduate and graduate students studying incentives as part of courses in microeconomics, economic theory, managerial economics, political economy, and related areas of social science.