Characterizations of pivotal mechanisms in the queueing problem

•Queueing models feature a number of agents desiring a service who can be served only one at a time.•In such models, we characterize all anonymous VCG mechanisms.•Using the above result and independence axioms, we characterize the pivotal and reward-based pivotal mechanisms.•We characterize all kk-pivotal mechanisms by generalizing the independence axioms.

We characterize all anonymous VCG mechanisms by using queue efficiency, strategyproofness and equal treatment of equals. By additionally imposing independence axioms  , introduced by Chun (2006a) and Maniquet (2003), we characterize the pivotal and the reward-based pivotal mechanisms in the class of kk-pivotal mechanisms. We generalize the independence axioms to characterize the class of kk-pivotal mechanisms.