Game Theory, Nobel Prize & Auctions - Auction Primer Series – Part 1

William Vickrey, highly regarded as the founder of auction theory, was an economics professor at Columbia University when he published two papers outlining his views on auctions:

"Counterspeculation, Auctions, and Competitive Sealed Tenders", 1961, Journal of Finance

"Auction and Bidding Games", 1962, Recent Advances in Game Theory

In 1996 he received a Nobel Prize Â"for fundamental contributions to the economic theory of incentives under asymmetric information.Â" ItÂ's important to understand that asymmetric information is an essential component of auctions, where potential buyers have varying levels of knowledge about the value of the item.

Although Vickrey...
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