The Economics of Information - by Ian Molho (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Knowledge is a vital resource which confers strategic advantages on those that possess it, and provides the possibility of misuse and abuse with increasingly dangerous economic consequences.

From the Back Cover

Information is a key issuein decision making in economics and business. Being 'in the know' confers strategic advantages to people, allowing them to lie and/or cheat on their uninformed opponents. However, itis possible that all sides end up worse off in such situations, compared with the likely outcome under full information.

This new text is designed to take students through the key issues to give an understanding of the impact of imperfect and asymmetric information in an economic context. At each stage Molho analyses and explains the key points using clear models that set the outcome under imperfect information against that under full information. The book is divided into four major sections covering:

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  Adverse selection.


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  Signalling.


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  Moral hazard.


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  Mechanical design under imperfect information.

Each section also covers experimental studies that test the predictions of theory. This text is aimed mainly at undergraduate students and gives an accessible introduction to this crucial area of economic theory.

About the Author

Ian Molho is Reader in Applied Microeconomics in the Department of Economics, University of Newcastle. He was previously a research fellow at the University of Kent and his varied research interests include labor markets, game theory, the economics of information and evolutionary economics.