Counter-intuitive results in game theory

General comparative game statics results are derived in order to provide testable hypotheses in game-like situations. These results run counter to ordinary economic intuition. It becomes necessary to initially define whether a situation represents perfect competition or monopoly on the one hand or a game-like situation on the other hand because these different assumptions lead to greatly differing results. Several empirical applications of the theory are suggested.     

Choosing Among Regulatory Options in the United States Telecommunications Industry

We examine the determinants of the choice between rate-of-return regulation and incentive regulation in the United States telecommunications industry. We find that a state is more likely to select incentive regulation in any year: (1) when it has employed incentive regulation in the past; (2) when the Republican party controls both the executive and the legislative branches of the state government, but the Democratic party has controlled these branches historically; and (3) as the firms earnings under rate-of-return regulation increase toward the industry average. We also find that appointed regulators are more likely than their elected counterparts to revert to rate-of-return regulation.     

Clarence Ayres’s Critique of Orthodox Economic Theory

Mainstream economists and liberal politicians are criticizing the Third Way as it is being applied in the Netherlands. They argue that mutual consultation precludes an efficient adaptation to disturbances. The present study analyzes changes in wage and income policy in the Netherlands until 2005. It finds that wage and income policy has proven to be flexible enough to address “new” challenges in the Netherlands. The flexibility is rooted in a culture of tolerance that allows for some breaking of working rules. The latter arises from bounded socialization, that is, the imperfect transmission of information with respect to social working rules that result in similar but not identical copies of institutions.     

CANADIAN WHEAT EXPORTS IN THE INTERNATIONAL MARKET: AN EXPLORATORY ECONOMETRIC AND POLICY ANALYSIS

This study attempts to measure with a two-region model some of the key economic relationships for Canadian wheat in the world market. The excess demand function facing Canadian wheat exports was found to be price elastic. Dynamic policy multipliers were derived to calculate the effects on wheat exports and the world price of changes in policy instruments including the initial payment for wheat.
Cette étude a pour but de mesurer, au moyen d'un modèle portant sur deux régions, quelques-uns des principaux rapports économiques entre l'économie canadienne du blé et les marchés mondiaux. La fonction de demande excédentaire des exportations canadiennes de blé s'est vérifiée élastique par rapport au prix. Les effets de changements dans les instruments de la politique agricole, tels que le paiement initial du blé, sur les exportation canadiennes et sur le prix mondial du ble ont eté calcule au moyen de multiplicateurs dynamiques.     

The Trade and Welfare Effects of State Trading in China with Reference to COFCO

The use of state trading to manage imports and exports has been a long‐standing feature of China’s agricultural trade regime. While the use of state trading was modified by China’s accession to the WTO, state trading still dominates for some commodities, even though there have been recent attempts to diminish its importance. In this paper, we analyse the potential trade distorting effect of COFCO on market access and export competition by drawing on some recent research on the impact of STEs on agricultural trade. By using a calibrated model of China’s imports of wheat and exports of maize, we are able to quantify the size of the trade distortions.