Deepal Basak

Research

Topic: Don't Panic

A panic is an event in which a crisis occurs not because of weak fundamentals but because of strategic uncertainty (for instance, a bank run or sovereign debt default). In such problems, the players do not always act at the same time, and this can be an effective tool for persuasion. We study this problem from a dynamic adversarial information design perspective and find practical policies to reduce such panics.

• Panics and Early Warnings (with Zhen Zhou),  JPE 

How does a timely alert about the impending disaster eliminate panic?

• Diffusing Coordination Risk (with Zhen Zhou), AER

How do asynchronous moves help in coordination? 

• Frequent Stress Tests (with Mayur Choudhary and Zhen Zhou), working paper

How does conducting more stress tests help in averting bank runs?

Topic: Bargaining 

We study bargaining games, where an underlying state (such as public opinion) determines the cost of compromise for the players and possible uncertainty about the state. We provide rational explanations for some widely observed but unexplained phenomena. We also analyze the efficiency implications.

• Gambling over Public Opinion (with Joyee Deb),  AER

Why do political parties wait and see which way the public opinion moves before agreeing, and how does it affect welfare? 

• Bargaining under Almost Complete Information, JET

Does a small probability of being uninformed make a large difference in bargaining?

• Social Value of Public Information in Bargaining,  EJ

Does more information about a player improve social welfare in bargaining?

• Aspiration and Bargaining (with Urmee Khan),  under review

Why do people lowball or overreach instead of setting consistent aspirations in bargaining? 

Topic: Information Similarity 

Algorithms steer different individuals to different news and video content based on personal characteristics, thus affecting the informational similarity across people and their behavior. We propose an order of information similarity and characterize how information similarity affects incentives in strategic environments.

• Similarity of Information in Games (with Joyee Deb and Aditya Kuvalekar), working paper

What type of information homogenization encourages people to adopt the same strategy as others in a coordination game?

• Similarity of Information and collective action (with Joyee Deb and Aditya Kuvalekar), AER forthcoming

When does information similarity facilitate/impede collective action? 

Topic: Property Rights and Corrective Tax

• Optimal Tax under Dispersed and Distorted Beliefs (with Yunhui Zhao), JET R&R

When a social planner gets new information, what changes should be made to the corrective tax?

• Learning, Externality, and Optimal Financial Regulation (with Yunhui Zhao), JFS 

When does financial tranquility call for stringent regulation? 

• Alliance Acquisition and Excludability (with Krishnamurthy Subramanian), work in progress

When assets are non-excludable, which ownership structure is more efficient - alliance or acquisition?