Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP14610
Authors: Aner Sela
Abstract: We study two-sided matching contests with two sets of agents, each of which includes n heterogeneous agents with commonly known types. In the first stage, the agents simultaneously send their costly efforts and then the order of choosing a partner from the other set is determined according to the Tullock contest success function. In the second stage, each agent chooses a partner from the other set, and an agent has a positive revenue if there is a matching in which he chooses a partner from the other set and this partner also chooses him. We analyze the agents' equilibrium efforts in the first stage as well as their choices of partners in the second stage, and demonstrate that if the agents' values, which are functions of the types of the agents who are matched, are either multiplicative or additive, their efforts are not necessarily monotonically increasing in their types.
Keywords: matching; Tullock contest
JEL Codes: D44; J31; D72; D82
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| agents' types (L85) | agents' equilibrium efforts (D51) |
| agents' equilibrium efforts (D51) | matching outcomes (C52) |
| agents' types (L85) | matching outcomes (C52) |
| high-type agents' value functions (multiplicative) (C71) | high-type firms' efforts (D21) |
| low-type agents' value functions (multiplicative) (C71) | low-type firms' efforts (L29) |
| additive value functions (D46) | all firms exert the same positive effort (D21) |
| larger contests (nxn) (C72) | consistent patterns in agent behavior (C92) |