Econometrica

Journal Of The Econometric Society

An International Society for the Advancement of Economic
Theory in its Relation to Statistics and Mathematics

Edited by: Guido W. Imbens • Print ISSN: 0012-9682 • Online ISSN: 1468-0262

Econometrica: Mar, 2013, Volume 81, Issue 2

Identification and Inference in Ascending Auctions With Correlated Private Values

https://doi.org/10.3982/ECTA9431
p. 489-534

Andrés Aradillas‐López, Amit Gandhi, Daniel Quint

We introduce and apply a new nonparametric approach to identification and inference on data from ascending auctions. We exploit variation in the number of bidders across auctions to nonparametrically identify useful bounds on seller profit and bidder surplus using a general model of correlated private values that nests the standard independent private values (IPV) model. We also translate our identified bounds into closed form and asymptotically valid confidence intervals for several economic measures of interest. Applying our methods to much studied U.S. Forest Service timber auctions, we find evidence of correlation among values after controlling for a rich vector of relevant auction covariates; this correlation causes expected profit, the profit‐maximizing reserve price, and bidder surplus to be substantially lower than conventional (IPV) analysis of the data would suggest.


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Supplemental Material

Supplement to "Identification and Inference in Ascending Auctions with Correlated Private Values"

This supplement contains a full description of the estimators and their properties for the application in the paper.

Supplement to "Identification and Inference in Ascending Auctions with Correlated Private Values"

This zip file contains the replication files for the manuscript.

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