Mergers,multiperiod Cournot competition,and Coasian dynamics

Under the simplifying conditions of product homogeneity, linear demand, symmetric and constant marginal costs, the static Cournot–Nash equilibrium predicts that exogenous horizontal mergers generate losses for the participants if the participants represent less than 80% of the firms in the industry. I successfully challenge the applicability of this well-known merger paradox to markets for durable goods by introducing Coasian dynamics to the quantity competition, while maintaining all other simplifying conditions. I demonstrate that exogenous mergers with a relatively small number of insiders in industries with a relatively large initial number of firms can be profitable as long as the common discount factor is sufficiently high and the decision-making horizon is sufficiently long. Unlike previous research on mergers in durable-goods industries, the significance of the decision-making horizon is emphasized; mergers that are unprofitable in a short-horizon version of my model for all values of the discount factor can prove profitable in a long-horizon version provided that agents are sufficiently patient.     

The ‘flexible accelerator’ and optimization with a finite horizon

So-called ‘flexible accelerator’ or partial adjustment models can be derived from dynamic optimization under convex adjustment costs. However, even with time-invariant adjustment costs and constant discount rate, constancy of the speed of adjustment requires infinite horizon planning. Using a simple production model, it is shown here that for finite horizons, the adjustment may nevertheless be approximately constant for much of the time if the discount rate is high enough and if the marginal adjustment cost is sufficiently small.     

The optimality of optimal punishments in Cournot supergames

The result of Colombo and Labrecciosa [Colombo, Luca and Labrecciosa, Paola (2006). ‘The suboptimality of optimal punishments in Cournot supergames’, Economics Letters 90, pp. 116–121.] that optimal punishments are inferior to Nash-reversion trigger strategies with decreasing marginal costs is shown to be due to the output when a firm deviates from the punishment path becoming negative.     

Focusing effect and the poverty trap

I build a dynamic consumption-savings model in which agents׳ choices are distorted by the focusing effect: agents overweight the utility of goods in which their options differ more. I show that the consumption-savings choice depends both on the marginal return on savings and on the total return on savings, implying that the incentive to save may increase with the initial level of wealth. As a consequence, a salience-based poverty trap may exist when the marginal return on savings is sufficiently high and sufficiently flat. I also consider the case of a perfect credit market and show that a poverty trap may emerge when the salience of consumption is bounded above. I discuss policy implications. In particular, imposing upon an agent a punishment for decreasing savings below a threshold leads to a higher level of savings, even when the threshold triggering the punishment is not binding     

Egalitarianism and Efficiency in Repeated Symmetric Games

We analyze the symmetric equilibria of repeated symmetric games where there is a conflict of interests over equilibria—the battle-of-the-sexes or the hawk–dove game are key examples. If one restricts attention to symmetric equilibria, efficient equilibria must be egalitarian. For finitely repeated games, and generic discount factors, there is a unique outcome path which ensures efficiency within the class of symmetric equilibria. This is also true for the infinitely repeated games if the players are sufficiently impatient. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: C72, C73.     

Conjectural-variation models and supergames with price competition in a differentiated product oligopoly

Conjectural-variation models (CV models) are popular in empirical research as they infer the degree of market power from real data. Theorists of industrial organization, however, disapprove of them for lack of theoretical foundation arguing that dynamic reactions are forced into a static model with the strategy space and time horizon only loosely defined. The presented model follows an idea put forward by Cabral (1995) and demonstrates that the CV model can be interpreted as the joint-profit-maximizing steady-state reduced form of a price-setting supergame in a differentiated product market under optimal punishment strategies. For the symmetric two-firm case the CV parameter is shown to cover the full range of possible outcomes — from Bertrand competition to joint unconstrained monopoly — depending on the degree of product differentiation, market growth, bankruptcy risk, and the discount rate. For the asymmetric-cost case numerical calculations are provided.     

The value of commitment in contests and tournaments when observation is costly

We study the value of commitment in sequential contests when the follower faces small costs to observe the leader's effort. We show that the value of commitment vanishes entirely in this class of games. By contrast, in sequential tournaments—games where, at a cost, the follower can observe the effectiveness of the leader's effort—the value of commitment is preserved completely provided that the observation costs are sufficiently small.     

Bilateral matching and bargaining with private information

We study equilibria of a dynamic matching and bargaining game (DMBG) with two-sided private information bilateral bargaining. The model is a private information replica of Mortensen and Wright (2002). There are two kinds of frictions: time discounting and explicit search costs. A simple necessary and sufficient condition on parameters for existence of a nontrivial equilibrium is obtained. This condition is the same regardless whether the information is private or not. In addition, it is shown that when the discount rate is sufficiently small, the equilibrium is unique and has the property that every meeting results in trade.     

Money in occupied New Orleans, 1862–1868: A test of Selgin’s “salvaging” of Gresham’s Law

We examine the monetary experience of New Orleans when it was occupied during and immediately following the Civil War, using newly assembled data regarding the quantity and market value of the city’s municipal notes and the city’s fiscal position. Municipal notes, acceptable for taxes, circulated at face value in retail transactions (and at only a small discount in broker transactions) as long as their supply was sufficiently limited, and they fell out of circulation and were priced at a discount relative to interest-bearing municipal bonds, when concern arose about their overissue. The spontaneous rejection of New Orleans municipal notes exemplifies how choice in currency works when insufficiently backed money is not supported by legal tender laws.     

The optimal degree of cooperation in the repeated Prisoners' Dilemma with side payments

In the infinitely repeated Prisoners' Dilemma with side payments, we characterize the Pareto frontier of the set of subgame perfect equilibrium payoffs for all possible combinations of discount factors. Play paths implementing Pareto dominant equilibrium payoffs are uniquely determined in all but the first period. Full cooperation does not necessarily implement these payoffs even when it maximizes total stage game payoffs. Rather, when the difference in players' discount factors is sufficiently large, Pareto dominant equilibrium payoffs are implemented by partial cooperation supported by repeated payments from the impatient to the patient player. When both players are sufficiently patient, such payoffs, while implemented via full cooperation, are supported by repeated payments from the impatient to the patient player. We characterize conditions under which public randomization has no impact on the Pareto dominant equilibrium payoffs and conditions under which such payoffs are robust to renegotiation.     

SOCIAL NORMS,LOCAL INTERACTION,AND NEIGHBORHOOD PLANNING*

This article examines optimal social linkage when each individual's repeated interaction with each of his neighbors creates spillovers. Each individual's discount factor is randomly determined. A planner chooses a local interaction network or neighborhood design before the discount factors are realized. Each individual then plays a repeated Prisoner's Dilemma game with his neighbors. A local trigger strategy equilibrium (LTSE) describes an equilibrium in which each individual conditions his cooperation on the cooperation of at least one “acceptable” group of neighbors. Our main results demonstrate a basic trade‐off in the design problem between suboptimal punishment and social conflict. Potentially suboptimal punishment arises in designs with local interactions since in this case monitoring is imperfect. Owing to the heterogeneity of discount factors, however, greater social conflict may arise in more connected networks. When individuals' discount factors are known to the planner, the optimal design exhibits a cooperative “core” and an uncooperative “fringe.”“Uncooperative” (impatient) types are connected to cooperative ones who tolerate their free riding so that social conflict is kept to a minimum. By contrast, when the planner knows only the ex ante distribution over individual discount factors, then in some cases the optimal design partitions individuals into maximally connected cliques (e.g., cul‐de‐sacs), whereas in other cases incomplete graphs with small overlap (e.g., grids) are possible.     

Standards and the regulation of environmental risk

We study regulatory design for a pollution-generating firm who is better informed than the regulator regarding pollution mitigation possibilities, and who chooses an unobservable action when employing a particular mitigation plan. We distinguish among performance, process, and design standards, and study the relative merit of each type of regulatory instrument. Relative to previous work on standards design, we emphasize technology and process verification. An optimal performance standard is relatively strict when regulator and firm preferences are congruent, but the regulator may prefer no performance standard at all if verification costs are sufficiently high. A process standard unambiguously increases expected surplus (relative to no regulation) in some environments, and otherwise improves welfare only when it is unlikely to generate a “bad” technology choice by the firm. A design standard can improve welfare if the regulator is sufficiently well informed about the technological possibilities for pollution control, but only when the firm’s private benefits from technology choice are sufficiently small.     

Copy-protection policies and profitability

This paper examines the publisher's optimal copy-protection policies. Even if copying is more cost-efficient than producing an original, private copying harms the publisher for two reasons. First, the copy users’ contribution to the original's price is too small, and second, there is a time lag between providing the original and distributing copies. If and only if both production costs of copies and institutional costs of the distribution of copies are sufficiently small; does controlling the number of copies benefit the publisher. However, the publisher's optimal number of copies is too low from a social welfare perspective.     

Intergenerational transfers and the social discount rate

This paper investigates the relationship between intergenerational asset transfers and the choice of the discount rate for use in cost-benefit analysis in a model of a competitive overlapping generations economy constrained by a socially managed exhaustible resource. Provided that there are no distortions in capital markets and that all agents hold perfect foresight, cost-benefit techniques will result in a Pareto efficient resource allocation if the discount rate is set equal to the market rate of interest. But since the path of the interest rate depends on the level of intergenerational transfers, cost-benefit techniques do not ensure a socially desirable distribution of welfare between generations; a social optimum will result only if intergenerational transfers are properly chosen and enforced. Decentralized private altruism may result in intergenerational transfers that both present and future individuals would agree are too small if members of the present generation attach positive weight to the general welfare of future generations, not simply their personal descendants. In a world where intergenerational transfers are non-optimal, second-best policy-making may imply a constrained optimum that is inefficient. Together, these findings suggest that cost-benefit analysis is at best a partial criterion to policy formulation that should be used only in conjunction with ethical principles that define the proper distribution of welfare between present and future generations.     

The Price Impact of Lending Relationships

This study analyzes the impact of bank relationships on a firm's borrowing costs. We find that a firm's borrowing costs decrease with relationship strength, proxied by the share of bank debt provided by the lender. Borrowing costs, however, rise with relationship length. While the increase over time is weak on average, bank‐dependent borrowers face a substantial premium after several relationship years. Switching the lender initially leads to only a small price discount on average. However, the discount is considerable for borrowers that switch and had a strong relationship with their previous lender. Our results suggest that close lending relationships lead to benefits for the firm, but may also imply hold‐up costs in the long term.     

The Policy Function of a Discrete-Choice Problem is a Random Number Generator

This paper studies a life-cycle model in which the consumption good is assumed to be indivisible. This assumption requires the number of units of the good purchased in each period to be an integer. It is shown that, if the discount factor (β) is sufficiently small, the policy function takes the form of a pseudo-random number generator or, more precisely, a linear congruential generator. It is also shown that optimal plans are almost always asymptotically non-periodic regardless of the discount factor. Various numerical examples of the value function and the policy function are provided.
JEL Classification Numbers: C61, D91, E32.     

On the Design of Peer Punishment Experiments

Some peer punishment technologies may bias experimental results in unwanted ways. A critical parameter to consider in the design is the “fine-to-fee” ratio, which measures the income reduction for the targeted subject relative to the cost for the subject who requested the punishment. We show that a punishment technology commonly used in experiments embeds a variable fine-to-fee ratio and show that it could confound the empirical findings about why, whom, and how much subjects punish.JEL Classification: C91, C92     

Exchange rate pass-through in Canadian manufacturing: its direct and indirect components

Changes in the exchange rate have direct and indirect effects on the prices of domestically produced goods and imports in the domestic market. The direct effects originate with the impact of the exchange rate on the marginal cost of imports; the indirect effects, with its impact on the price of materials used by domestic producers and hence on their marginal costs. Direct and indirect exchange rate pass-through elasticities are estimated for 37 Canadian manufacturing industries and their determinants are examined in a cross-section analysis. It is found that the direct and indirect elasticities are approximately equal in size for domestic goods, while the direct effect is dominant for imports. For a small number of industries, the net result of the direct and indirect effects is that a depreciation of the domestic currency increases the competitiveness of imports, contrary to conventional analysis. Important determinants of the direct (indirect) elasticities are the import share and non-tariff barriers (the responsiveness of domestic costs to changes in the exchange rate, and concentration).     

Reconciling sustainability, systems theory and discounting

Most definitions of sustainability imply that a system is to be maintained at a certain level, held within certain limits, into the indefinite future. Sustainability denies run-away growth, but it also avoids any decline or destruction. This sustainability path is hard to reconcile with the renewal cycle that can be observed in many natural systems developing according to their intrinsic mechanisms and in social systems responding to internal and external pressures. Systems are parts of hierarchies where systems of higher levels are made up of subsystems from lower levels. Renewal in components is an important factor of adaptation and evolution. If a system is sustained for too long, it borrows from the sustainability of a supersystem and rests upon lack of sustainability in subsystems. Therefore by sustaining certain systems beyond their renewal cycle, we decrease the sustainability of larger, higher-level systems. For example, Schumpeter's theory of creative destruction posits that in a capitalist economy, the collapse and renewal of firms and industries is necessary to sustain the vitality of the larger economic system. However, if the capitalist economic system relies on endless growth, then sustaining it for too long will inevitably borrow from the sustainability of the global ecosystem. This could prove catastrophic for humans and other species. To reconcile sustainability with hierarchy theory, we must decide which hierarchical level in a system we want to sustain indefinitely, and accept that lower level subsystems must have shorter life spans. In economic analysis, inter-temporal discount rates essentially tell us how long we should care about sustaining any given system. Economists distinguish between discount rates for individuals based on personal time preference, lower discount rates for firms based on the opportunity cost of capital, and even lower discount rates for society. For issues affecting even higher-level systems, such as global climate change, many economists question the suitability of discounting future values at all. We argue that to reconcile sustainability with inter-temporal discounting, discount rates should be determined by the hierarchical level of the system being analyzed.