The Failure of the Paretian Criterion to Evaluate Efficiency
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Price Competition with Satisficing Consumers
View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Aberdeen University Research Archive Price Competition with Satisficing Consumers∗ Mauro Papiy Abstract The ‘satisficing’ heuristic by Simon (1955) has recently attracted attention both theoretically and experimentally. In this paper I study a price-competition model in which the consumer is satisficing and firms can influence his aspiration price via marketing. Unlike existing models, whether a price comparison is made depends on both pricing and marketing strategies. I fully characterize the unique symmetric equilibrium by investigating the implications of satisficing on various aspects of market competition. The proposed model can help explain well-documented economic phenomena, such as the positive correla- tion between marketing and prices observed in some markets. JEL codes: C79, D03, D43. Keywords: Aspiration Price, Bounded Rationality, Price Competition, Satisficing, Search. ∗This version: August 2017. I would like to thank the Editor of this journal, two anonymous referees, Ed Hopkins, Hans Hvide, Kohei Kawamura, Ran Spiegler, the semi- nar audience at universities of Aberdeen, East Anglia, and Trento, and the participants to the 2015 OLIGO workshop (Madrid) and the 2015 Econometric Society World Congress (Montreal) for their comments. Financial support from the Aberdeen Principal's Excel- lence Fund and the Scottish Institute for Research in Economics is gratefully acknowledged. Any error is my own responsibility. yBusiness School, University of Aberdeen - Edward Wright Building, Dunbar Street, AB24 3QY, Old Aberdeen, Scotland, UK. E-mail address: [email protected]. 1 1 Introduction According to Herbert Simon (1955), in most global models of rational choice, all alternatives are eval- uated before a choice is made. -
Industrial Organization 06 Market Structure and Market Power
Industrial Organization 06 Market structure and market power Marc Bourreau Telecom ParisTech Marc Bourreau (TPT) Lecture 06: Market structure and market power 1 / 39 Outline 1 Introduction: definition of market power 2 Definition of relevant market An example: market definition in the telecommunications sector Approach based on cross price-elasticities Other approaches 3 The relationship between concentration and market power An example with the Cournot oligopoly model Issues in measuring concentration and market power Other concentration measures Other market power measures 4 The SCP paradigm 5 Some elements about the control of concentration Marc Bourreau (TPT) Lecture 06: Market structure and market power 2 / 39 Introduction Introduction Remember, from the lecture on Monopoly: Definition of "market power" The ability of a firm to raise its price over marginal cost. Importance of measuring "market power": In competition policy, some practices (for instance, bundling) are illegal if a firm has market power. In order to estimate the market power of a firm, we need to define first the relevant market. Marc Bourreau (TPT) Lecture 06: Market structure and market power 3 / 39 Market definition Definition of the relevant market Two questions: Product market Which products should we include in the "market"? Geographical market Which geographical zone do we have to consider? An economic definition of the market A market can be defined as a group of products presenting strong demand- substitutability and supply-substitutability. Marc Bourreau (TPT) Lecture 06: Market structure and market power 4 / 39 Market definition Definition of the relevant market Definition of the European Commission (1997) The relevant market includes all the products and/or services considered as interchangeable or substitutable on the account of product characteristics, price, and regular use. -
The Three Types of Collusion: Fixing Prices, Rivals, and Rules Robert H
University of Baltimore Law ScholarWorks@University of Baltimore School of Law All Faculty Scholarship Faculty Scholarship 2000 The Three Types of Collusion: Fixing Prices, Rivals, and Rules Robert H. Lande University of Baltimore School of Law, [email protected] Howard P. Marvel Ohio State University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.law.ubalt.edu/all_fac Part of the Antitrust and Trade Regulation Commons, and the Law and Economics Commons Recommended Citation The Three Types of Collusion: Fixing Prices, Rivals, and Rules, 2000 Wis. L. Rev. 941 (2000) This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Faculty Scholarship at ScholarWorks@University of Baltimore School of Law. It has been accepted for inclusion in All Faculty Scholarship by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@University of Baltimore School of Law. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ARTICLES THE THREE TYPES OF COLLUSION: FIXING PRICES, RIVALS, AND RULES ROBERTH. LANDE * & HOWARDP. MARVEL** Antitrust law has long held collusion to be paramount among the offenses that it is charged with prohibiting. The reason for this prohibition is simple----collusion typically leads to monopoly-like outcomes, including monopoly profits that are shared by the colluding parties. Most collusion cases can be classified into two established general categories.) Classic, or "Type I" collusion involves collective action to raise price directly? Firms can also collude to disadvantage rivals in a manner that causes the rivals' output to diminish or causes their behavior to become chastened. This "Type 11" collusion in turn allows the colluding firms to raise prices.3 Many important collusion cases, however, do not fit into either of these categories. -
Collusion Constrained Equilibrium
Theoretical Economics 13 (2018), 307–340 1555-7561/20180307 Collusion constrained equilibrium Rohan Dutta Department of Economics, McGill University David K. Levine Department of Economics, European University Institute and Department of Economics, Washington University in Saint Louis Salvatore Modica Department of Economics, Università di Palermo We study collusion within groups in noncooperative games. The primitives are the preferences of the players, their assignment to nonoverlapping groups, and the goals of the groups. Our notion of collusion is that a group coordinates the play of its members among different incentive compatible plans to best achieve its goals. Unfortunately, equilibria that meet this requirement need not exist. We instead introduce the weaker notion of collusion constrained equilibrium. This al- lows groups to put positive probability on alternatives that are suboptimal for the group in certain razor’s edge cases where the set of incentive compatible plans changes discontinuously. These collusion constrained equilibria exist and are a subset of the correlated equilibria of the underlying game. We examine four per- turbations of the underlying game. In each case,we show that equilibria in which groups choose the best alternative exist and that limits of these equilibria lead to collusion constrained equilibria. We also show that for a sufficiently broad class of perturbations, every collusion constrained equilibrium arises as such a limit. We give an application to a voter participation game that shows how collusion constraints may be socially costly. Keywords. Collusion, organization, group. JEL classification. C72, D70. 1. Introduction As the literature on collective action (for example, Olson 1965) emphasizes, groups often behave collusively while the preferences of individual group members limit the possi- Rohan Dutta: [email protected] David K. -
Interim Correlated Rationalizability
Interim Correlated Rationalizability The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Dekel, Eddie, Drew Fudenberg, and Stephen Morris. 2007. Interim correlated rationalizability. Theoretical Economics 2, no. 1: 15-40. Published Version http://econtheory.org/ojs/index.php/te/article/view/20070015 Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:3196333 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA Theoretical Economics 2 (2007), 15–40 1555-7561/20070015 Interim correlated rationalizability EDDIE DEKEL Department of Economics, Northwestern University, and School of Economics, Tel Aviv University DREW FUDENBERG Department of Economics, Harvard University STEPHEN MORRIS Department of Economics, Princeton University This paper proposes the solution concept of interim correlated rationalizability, and shows that all types that have the same hierarchies of beliefs have the same set of interim-correlated-rationalizable outcomes. This solution concept charac- terizes common certainty of rationality in the universal type space. KEYWORDS. Rationalizability, incomplete information, common certainty, com- mon knowledge, universal type space. JEL CLASSIFICATION. C70, C72. 1. INTRODUCTION Harsanyi (1967–68) proposes solving games of incomplete -
The United States Has a Market Concentration Problem Reviewing Concentration Estimates in Antitrust Markets, 2000-Present
THE UNITED STATES HAS A MARKET CONCENTRATION PROBLEM REVIEWING CONCENTRATION ESTIMATES IN ANTITRUST MARKETS, 2000-PRESENT ISSUE BRIEF BY ADIL ABDELA AND MARSHALL STEINBAUM1 | SEPTEMBER 2018 Since the 1970s, America’s antitrust policy regime has been weakening and market power has been on the rise. High market concentration—in which few firms compete in a given market—is one indicator of market power. From 1985 to 2017, the number of mergers completed annually rose from 2,308 to 15,361 (IMAA 2017). Recently, policymakers, academics, and journalists have questioned whether the ongoing merger wave, and lax antitrust enforcement more generally, is indeed contributing to rising concentration, and in turn, whether concentration really portends a market power crisis in the economy. In this issue brief, we review the estimates of market concentration that have been conducted in a number of industries since 2000 as part of merger retrospectives and other empirical investigations. The result of that survey is clear: market concentration in the U.S. economy is high, according to the thresholds adopted by the antitrust agencies themselves in the Horizontal Merger Guidelines. By way of background, recent studies of industry concentration conclude that it is both high and rising over time. For example, Grullon, Larkin, and Michaely conclude that concentration increased in 75% of industries from 1997 to 2012. In response to these and similar studies, the antitrust enforcement agencies recently declared that their findings are not relevant to the question of whether market concentration has increased because they study industrial sectors, not antitrust markets. Specifically, they wrote, “The U.S. -
Harvard Law Review 132, No. 2, December 2018, Pp
SURESH NAIDU November 12, 2019 BUSINESS ADDRESS: 1405 IAB MC 3328 [email protected] 420 W. 118th St. www.santafe.edu/~snaidu New York, NY. 10027 APPOINTMENTS: Professor, Department of Economics/SIPA, Columbia University. September-December 2016 Visiting Researcher Princeton University Industrial Relations Section. July 2010-July 2016 - Assistant Professor, Department of Economics/SIPA, Columbia University. August 2013-May 2014 – Visiting Assistant Professor, MIT Department of Economics. 2008-2010 - Harvard Academy Junior Scholar Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard University. OTHER AFFILIATIONS: Santa Fe Institute External Faculty Roosevelt Institute Fellow NBER Faculty Research Fellow (DEV, POL, and, DAE) BREAD faculty affiliate Microsoft Research New York: Visiting Researcher (2016-2017), Consulting Researcher (2017-2018). Faculty Affiliate with Columbia University Population Research Center and Data Sciences Institute. Social Science Research Council Working Group on Big Data in the Historical Social Sciences. EDUCATION: DEGREE DATE FIELD University of California, Berkeley Ph.D. December 2008 Economics University of Massachusetts, Amherst M.A. August 2004 Economics University of Waterloo B.Math.(With Distinction) May 2001 Pure Mathematics (minor in Peace and Conflict Studies) PUBLISHED PAPERS: “Text-based Ideal Points” (with David Blei and Keyon Vafa) -Proceedings of the 58th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics 2020. “Do Americans Want to Tax Capital? Evidence from Online Surveys” (with Ray Fisman, Ilyana Kuziemko, and Keith Gladstone). -Forthcoming in Journal of Public Economics.. “Monopsony in Online Labor Markets” (with Arindrajit Dube, Jeff Jacobs, and Siddarth Suri) -American Economic Review- Insights, 2(1) March 2020. 33-46. “American Slavery and Labor Market Power” -Economic History of Developing Regions, 35(1), January 2020 3-22. -
Tacit Collusion in Oligopoly"
Tacit Collusion in Oligopoly Edward J. Green,y Robert C. Marshall,z and Leslie M. Marxx February 12, 2013 Abstract We examine the economics literature on tacit collusion in oligopoly markets and take steps toward clarifying the relation between econo- mists’analysis of tacit collusion and those in the legal literature. We provide examples of when the economic environment might be such that collusive pro…ts can be achieved without communication and, thus, when tacit coordination is su¢ cient to elevate pro…ts versus when com- munication would be required. The authors thank the Human Capital Foundation (http://www.hcfoundation.ru/en/), and especially Andrey Vavilov, for …nancial support. The paper bene…tted from discussions with Roger Blair, Louis Kaplow, Bill Kovacic, Vijay Krishna, Steven Schulenberg, and Danny Sokol. We thank Gustavo Gudiño for valuable research assistance. [email protected], Department of Economics, Penn State University [email protected], Department of Economics, Penn State University [email protected], Fuqua School of Business, Duke University 1 Introduction In this chapter, we examine the economics literature on tacit collusion in oligopoly markets and take steps toward clarifying the relation between tacit collusion in the economics and legal literature. Economists distinguish between tacit and explicit collusion. Lawyers, using a slightly di¤erent vocabulary, distinguish between tacit coordination, tacit agreement, and explicit collusion. In hopes of facilitating clearer communication between economists and lawyers, in this chapter, we attempt to provide a coherent resolution of the vernaculars used in the economics and legal literature regarding collusion.1 Perhaps the easiest place to begin is to de…ne explicit collusion. -
Imbalanced Collusive Security Games
Imbalanced Collusive Security Games Han-Ching Ou, Milind Tambe, Bistra Dilkina, and Phebe Vayanos Computer Science Department, University of Southern California {hanchino,tambe,dilkina,phebe.vayanos }@usc.edu Abstract. Colluding adversaries is a crucial challenge for defenders in many real-world applications. Previous literature has provided Collusive Security Games (COSG) to model colluding adversaries, and provided models and algorithms to generate defender strategies to counter colluding adversaries, often by devising strategies that inhibit collusion [6]. Unfortunately, this previous work focused exclusively on situations with perfectly matched adversaries, i.e., where their rewards were symmetrically distributed. In the real world, however, defenders often face adversaries where their rewards are asymmetrically distributed. Such inherent asymmetry raises a question as to whether human adversaries would at- tempt to collude in such situations, and whether defender strategies to counter such collusion should focus on inhibiting collusion. To address these open ques- tions, this paper: (i) explores and theoretically analyzes Imbalanced Collusive Security Games (ICOSG) where defenders face adversaries with asymmetrically distributed rewards; (ii) conducts extensive experiments of three different adver- sary models involving 1800 real human subjects and (iii) derives novel analysis of the reason behind why bounded rational attackers models outperform perfectly rational attackers models. The key principle discovered as the result of our -
Econstor Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre Make Your Publications Visible
A Service of Leibniz-Informationszentrum econstor Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre Make Your Publications Visible. zbw for Economics Stähler, Frank Working Paper — Digitized Version Markov perfection and cooperation in repeated games Kiel Working Paper, No. 760 Provided in Cooperation with: Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW) Suggested Citation: Stähler, Frank (1996) : Markov perfection and cooperation in repeated games, Kiel Working Paper, No. 760, Kiel Institute of World Economics (IfW), Kiel This Version is available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/46946 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. personal and scholarly purposes. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle You are not to copy documents for public or commercial Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich purposes, to exhibit the documents publicly, to make them machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. publicly available on the internet, or to distribute or otherwise use the documents in public. Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, If the documents have been made available under an Open gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. www.econstor.eu Kieler Arbeitspapiere Kiel Working Papers Kiel Working Paper No. 760 Markov perfection and cooperation in repeated games by Frank Stahler August 1996 Institut fur Weltwirtschaft an der Universitat Kiel The Kiel Institute of World Economics ISSN 0342 - 0787 The Kiel Institute of World Economics Diisternbrooker Weg 120 D-24105Kiel, FRG Kiel Working Paper No. -
The Rise of Market Power and the Macroeconomic Implications∗
The Rise of Market Power and the Macroeconomic Implications∗ Jan De Loeckery Jan Eeckhoutz Gabriel Ungerx KU Leuven UPF Barcelona (ICREA, GSE) Harvard University NBER and CEPR and UCL November 15, 2019 Abstract We document the evolution of market power based on firm-level data for the US econ- omy since 1955. We measure both markups and profitability. In 1980, average markups start to rise from 21% above marginal cost to 61% now. The increase is driven mainly by the upper tail of the markup distribution: the upper percentiles have increased sharply. Quite strikingly, the median is unchanged. In addition to the fattening upper tail of the markup distribution, there is reallocation of market share from low to high markup firms. This rise occurs mostly within industry. We also find an increase in the average profit rate from 1% to 8%. While there is also an increase in overhead costs, the markup increase is in excess of overhead. We then discuss the macroeconomic implications of an increase in average market power, which can account for a number of secular trends in the last four decades, most notably the declining labor and capital shares as well as the decrease in labor market dynamism. Keywords: Market Power; Markups; Profits; Secular Trends; Labor Market; Declining Labor Share. JEL: E2, D2, D4, J3, K2, L1 ∗We would like to thank Mark Aguiar, Pol Antras,` John Asker, Eric Bartelsman, Susanto Basu, Steve Berry, Tim Bresnahan, Emmanuel Farhi, Xavier Gabaix, Bob Hall, John Haltiwanger, Eric Hurst, Loukas Karabarbounis, Patrick Kehoe, Pete Klenow, Christian Michel, Ariel Pakes, Thomas Philippon, Esteban Rossi-Hansberg, Chad Syverson, James Traina, Jo Van Biesebroeck and Frank Verboven for insightful discussions and comments. -
Collusion and Heterogeneity of Firms∗
Collusion and Heterogeneity of Firms∗ Ichiro Obaray Federico Zincenko z June 13, 2016 Abstract We examine the impact of heterogeneous discounting on collusion in dynamic Bertrand competition. We show exactly when collusion can be sustained and how collusion would be organized efficiently with heterogeneous discounting. First we show that collusion is possible if and only if the average discount factor exceeds a certain threshold, with or without capacity constraints. Next we identify a dynamic pattern of market share that characterizes efficient collusion and obtain the unique long-run prediction despite the presence of multiple equilibria. In the long run, the most patient firm and the most impatient firm tend to dominate the market. JEL Classification: C72, C73, D43. Keywords: Bertrand Competition, Capacity Constraint, Collusion, Repeated Game, Subgame Perfect Equilibrium. Unequal Discounting. ∗This article was developed from the second chapter (co-authored with I. Obara) of Zincenko's doctoral dissertation at UCLA. We would like to thank the editor and anonymous referees for their useful comments. We also like to thank the participants at many seminars at various universities, 2011 Asian Meeting of the Econometric Society at Korea University, 2012 Southwest Economic Theory Conference at UC San Diego, and 2013 North American Summer Meeting of the Econometric Society at USC. All remaining errors are ours. yUniversity of California, Los Angeles; [email protected]. zUniversity of Pittsburgh; [email protected]. 1 1 Introduction To understand when and how collusion arises with heterogeneous discounting, we study a dynamic Bertrand competition model, in which firms discount future profits at different discount rates, and examine the impact of heterogeneous discounting on collusion.