Mechanism Design in Public Project Decision Problems: Theory and Experiments

2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 19K01541
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Review Section: Basic Section 07010:Economic theory-related
• Research Institution: Tokyo Institute of Technology
• Principal Investigator: Yamato Takehiko 東京工業大学, 工学院, 教授 (90246778)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): 瀋 俊毅 神戸大学, 経済経営研究所, 教授 (10432460)
• Project Period (FY): 2019-04-01 – 2024-03-31
• Keywords: メカニズム・デザイン

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We conduct an experimental comparison of two well-known mechanisms for undertaking a binary public project: the pivotal mechanism and the voluntary contribution mechanism. We then observe that the voluntary contribution mechanism works better than the pivotal mechanism from the perspectives of Pareto efficiency, individual rationality, and surplus maximization.
We also compare the voluntary contribution mechanism with any mechanism attaining Pareto-efficient allocations when each agent can choose whether he/she participates in the mechanism for the provision of a non-excludable public good. We find that, in our participation game, the voluntary contribution mechanism, because of its higher participation probability in the unique symmetric mixed strategy Nash equilibrium, may perform better than any Pareto-efficient mechanism in terms of the equilibrium expected provision level of the public good and the equilibrium expected payoff of each agent.

Free Research Field

ミクロ経済学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

ある一定の規模の公共財を供給するか否かを決める公共プロジェクトの実施問題において、自発的支払メカニズムの方がピボタル・メカニズムより高いパフォーマンスを示すことを実験で発見した。さらに、公共財供給メカニズムに各主体が参加するか否かを決めるケースでは、自発的支払メカニズムの方がパレート効率なメカニズムより良い結果を導く可能性を指摘した。これらの結果は、全員参加の場合には自発的支払メカニズムはパレート効率な配分を達成できないものの、自発的支払メカニズムの方がよりうまく機能する可能性を示唆し、現実社会でなぜ自発的支払メカニズムが多く用いられているかについて一つの説明を与えている。