Milgrom and Wilson on Auction Theory and Market Design

On the occasion of the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony in Stockholm, the PPE centre at the University of Groningen will host a seminar on the work of the Nobel Laureates in Economic Science 2020 on the same day.

The Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences 2020 was awarded to Paul Milgrom and Robert Wilson for their “improvements to auction theory and inventions of new auction formats” (Royal Academy of Science, 2020). On the 10th of December, on occasion of the Nobel Prize ceremony that will take place in Stockholm, the PPE centre at RUG will host an online seminar where Marco Haan (University of Groningen) and Maarten Janssen (University of Vienna) will discuss some of the most salient and controversial aspects of this research program.

After a brief introduction on the content of the laureates’ research, the speakers will address more general questions about the meaning of this research program for economic science at large, such as: How did this work affect the direction of economic research in auction theory since the main results were published in the sixties? Is this a prize that acknowledges a theoretical piece of economic work, or rather a pioneering research where theoretical and experimental economics proceeded hand in hand from the outset?

Other topics of discussion will concern some of the political implications of market design, among which: Who is ultimately benefiting from auctions? Should economic theory serve the state and private businesses alike? And, especially in days like these, should the Nobel Prize be assigned to research that focuses on more societally relevant issues for our times. If not, why?

The seminar is not only meant to make the topic of the research of the awardees more accessible to non-experts. But also, it will provide an occasion to reflect on more general questions about the methodological impact of this research program as well as its political implications.

• Speakers: Maarten Janssen (Vienna) and Marco Haan (Groningen).
• Moderator: Emrah Aydinonat (Helsinki).
• Organizer: Chiara Lisciandra (Groningen)

Please contact organizer Chiara Lisciandra to join the Zoom session.