Course Details
Instructor: Professor Kira Goldner (goldner@).
Office Hours: Tuesday 3:15–4:15pm and by appointment.
Office Location: CCDS 1339.
Lectures:
Tuesday/Thursday 2:00—3:15pm, PSY B47.
Important Links:
- Course Policies: Syllabus
- For communication: Piazza access code AMD
- For submitting homework: Gradescope course entry code X2RX4Z
Course Description: This course is an introduction to the interdisciplinary area of Algorithmic Mechanism Design: where computational perspectives are applied to economic problems, and economic techniques are brought to problems from computer science. We will explore a broad range of topics at the frontier of new research, starting with some of the fundamentals, such as welfare-maximizing auctions and types of Nash Equilibria. Throughout the semester, the class will also learn about prevalent topics such as (1) Data Science & Incentives, (2) Mechanism Design for Social Good, and (3) optimization and robustness in mechanism design.
The course is aimed at graduate students but will be accessible to motivated advanced undergraduate or masters students with some background in proofs (DS 122), algorithms (DS 320), and probability (MA 581).
Homework: Biweekly homeworks will be posted on Piazza when they become available. Homework must be typed up using LaTeX; here is a quick resource on LaTeX and here is a LaTeX template you may use for the homework. Here is another short guide to LaTeX. You may find it easier to use Overleaf.
Lecture Schedule
Below is a table with that will reflect what we cover in each lecture and will point to corresponding reading material. Lectures listed more than one date in advance are tentative topics. There is no required textbook for this course, as all materials are available online for free and we will switch between materials. Some shorthand for the reading material:
- R1.x = Tim Roughgarden's AGT lecture notes, lecture x. (Alternatively available in book form here.)
- R2.x = Tim Roughgarden's AMD lecture notes, lecture x.
- Hx = Jason Hartline's textbook "Mechanism Design and Approximation," chapter x.
- Kx = Anna Karlin's textbook "Game Theory, Alive," chapter x. (Also in book form.)
| Date | Topic | Resources |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 2 | Overview and Policies, Intro to AGT | Worksheet, Notes, Slides, R1.1-2 |
| Sep 4 | Projects, Incentive Compatibility, & The Revelation Principle | Worksheet, Notes, R1.3-4, H2.10, Project Description, Project Rubric |
| Sep 9 | Bayesian Settings and Revenue Equivalence | Worksheet, Notes, H2.3,2.5,2.7 |
| Sep 11 | Myersonian Virtual Welfare and Quantile Space | Worksheet, Notes, R1.5, H3.3-4 |
| Sep 16 | Ironing Virtual Values | Worksheet, Notes, H3.3.3-4 |
| Sep 18 | Multidimensional Settings and VCG, Interdependent Values I | Worksheet, Notes, R1.7 |
| Sep 23 | Discussions about Project Ideas (OH) | |
| Sep 25 | Interdependent Valuations II | Worksheet, Notes, EFFGK '19 |
| Sep 30 | Behavioral Economics and Mechanism Design I | Worksheet, Notes, Shengwu's Tutorial |
| Oct 2 | NO CLASS (Yom Kippur) | |
| Oct 7 | Behavioral Economics II | Worksheet, Notes, Shengwu's Talk |
| Oct 9 | MD4SG I: Health Insurance Markets | Worksheet, Notes, EGW '24, EAAMO |
| Oct 14 | NO CLASS (Monday schedule) | Oct 16 | MD4SG II: Kidney Exchange | Worksheet, Notes |
| Oct 21 | MD4SG III: Democracy, Summary of MD4SG Directions | Worksheet | Oct 23 | Prophet Inequalities | R1.6, KW '12 |
| Oct 28 | Balanced Prices: A Multidimensional Extension of Prophet Inequalities | FGL '15, DFKL '17 |
| Oct 30 | KVV, Prior Independence: Bulow-Klemperer & Single Sample | R1.6, H5.2-3 | Nov 4 | Gains from Trade in Two-Sided Markets | BGG '20 |
| Nov 6 | Machine Learning and Incentives | Chara's Tutorial |
| Nov 11 | Ascending Auctions I | R2.1-2 |
| Nov 13 | Ascending Auctions II & Walrasian Equilibria | R2.2-3,5 |
| Nov 18 | Attend BEACH Day! | |
| Nov 20 | Linear Programming Duality | Nov 25 | TBD |
| Nov 27 | NO CLASS (Thanksgiving) | |
| Dec 2 | Project Presentations | |
| Dec 4 | Project Presentations | |
| Dec 9 | Project Presentations | |
| Dec 16 | Project Reports Due 3pm |
Huge gratitude to Jason Hartline and Tim Roughgarden for their publicly available materials which have made the development of this course possible.