
TL;DR
This paper explores efficient payoff sharing mechanisms in risky joint research, demonstrating that simple, effort-based credit allocations can achieve efficiency even with limited observability and non-contractible winner identity.
Contribution
It introduces minimal-information mechanisms that effectively address inefficiencies in strategic experimentation by allocating payoffs asymmetrically and based on effort at breakthrough.
Findings
Asymmetric payoff allocation achieves efficiency.
Effort-based credit sharing suffices when winner's identity is non-contractible.
Simple mechanisms are robust and effective in strategic research settings.
Abstract
How can one efficiently share payoffs with collaborators when participating in risky research? First, I show that efficiency can be achieved by allocating payoffs asymmetrically between the researcher who makes a breakthrough ("winner") and the others, even if agents cannot observe others' effort. When the winner's identity is non-contractible, allocating credit based on effort at time of breakthrough also suffices to achieve efficiency; so the terminal effort profile, rather than the full history of effort, is a sufficient statistic. These findings suggest that simple mechanisms using minimal information are robust and effective in addressing inefficiencies in strategic experimentation.
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Taxonomy
TopicsExperimental Behavioral Economics Studies · Auction Theory and Applications · Game Theory and Applications
