Making efficient public good decisions using an augmented Ausubel auction

Abstract

We provide the generalization of Ausubel’s 2004 ascending bid auction to public good environments. Like its private good counterpart, the public good Ausubel auction encourages truthful revelation of preferences, is privacy preserving, and yields an equilibrium allocation that is outcome equivalent to the public good Vickrey auction. Other properties are not ideal in a public good setting. We discuss two such issues and propose an alternative dynamic auction which solves these problems.