Durable-Goods Monopoly with Privately Known Impatience: A Theoretical and Experimental Study

Abstract

We analyze a durable-goods monopoly which sells a single unit of a good to a buyer whose value of the good is private information. The discount factors of the buyer and the seller may differ and they are private knowledge. We solve for the closed-form solution of a two-period game and compare this solution with the behavior observed in laboratory experiments. The data are to a large extent consistent with the predictions.