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: Jul, 2023, Volume 91, Issue 4

Sequential Veto Bargaining with Incomplete Information

https://doi.org/10.3982/ECTA20658
p. 1527-1562

S. Nageeb Ali, Navin Kartik, Andreas Kleiner

We study sequential bargaining between a proposer and a veto player. Both have single‐peaked preferences, but the proposer is uncertain about the veto player's ideal point. The proposer cannot commit to future proposals. When players are patient, there can be equilibria with Coasian dynamics: the veto player's private information can largely nullify proposer's bargaining power. Our main result, however, is that under some conditions there also are equilibria in which the proposer obtains the high payoff that he would with commitment power. The driving force is that the veto player's single‐peaked preferences give the proposer an option to “leapfrog,” that is, to secure agreement from only low‐surplus types early on to credibly extract surplus from high types later. Methodologically, we exploit the connection between sequential bargaining and static mechanism design.


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Supplemental Material

Supplement to "Sequential Veto Bargaining with Incomplete Information"

S. Nageeb Ali, Navin Kartik, and Andreas Kleiner

This online appendix conatins material not found within the manuscript.