A noncooperative model of contest network formation

In this paper we study a model of weighted network formation. The bilateral interaction is modeled as a Tullock contest game with the possibility of a draw. We describe stable networks under different concepts of stability. We show that a Nash stable network is either the empty network or the complete network. The complete network is not immune to bilateral deviations. When we allow for limited farsightedness, a stable network immune to bilateral deviations must be a complete $M$-partite network, with partitions of different sizes. We provide several comparative statics results illustrating the importance of the structure of stable networks in mediating the effects of shocks and interventions. In particular, we show that an increase in the likelihood of a draw has a nonmonotonic effect on the level of wasteful contest spending in the society. To the best of our knowledge, this paper is the first attempt to model weighted network formation when the actions of individuals are neither strategic complements nor strategic substitutes.     

商业信用环境、金融信贷与区域创新产出

基于2012-2018年284个地级市与92家城市商业银行的面板数据,分别检验商业信用环境对数字普惠金融信贷、传统金融信贷规模和区域创新产出的影响.研究表明:商业信用环境的优化能够有效增加地区城商行的信贷规模,也会对地区的数字普惠金融发展产生正向影响;商业信用环境改善不仅直接影响区域创新产出,还会通过影响金融信贷规模增...     

Investition in die Zukunft? Zur Entwicklung des deutschen Auslandsvermögens

Germany’s substantial current account surpluses are an ongoing subject of debate, both at the domestic and the European/ global level. Advocates of high surpluses emphasise the need to accumulate foreign wealth in order to finance future investment and consumption expenditures of an ageing population. This contribution gauges the profitability of Germany’s foreign wealth. It identifies large valuation losses to the tune of half a trillion euros in recent years as well as a persistently adverse trend in previous decades. This unfavourable development as well as historically low refinancing costs point to the comparatively greater benefits of a domestic investment offensive aiming to equip Germany for central long-term challenges.     

A minimum effort coordination game experiment in continuous time

We conduct an experiment on a minimum effort coordination game in a (quasi-)continuous time-frame, where effort choices can be switched freely during a 60-s period. The cooperation levels of the continuous time treatments are not significantly different from the discrete time treatments. Providing subjects with the information on the effort choices of all group members increases the average effort level in continuous time only. The minimum effort level in continuous time with full information feedback is also substantially higher than that with limited information feedback, but the difference is statistically insignificant. With limited information feedback, subjects rarely coordinate to increase their efforts simultaneously to change the group minimum within a period. Our findings imply that continuous time games are not behaviorally equivalent to infinitely repeated discrete time games.     

Confusopoly: competition and obfuscation in markets

This paper examines the effects of competition in experimental posted-offer markets where sellers can confuse buyers. I report two studies. In one, the sellers offering heterogeneous goods can obfuscate buyers by means of spurious product differentiation. In the other study, sellers offer identical goods and make their prices unnecessarily complex by having multi-part tariffs. I vary the level of competition by having treatments with two and three- sellers in both studies, and having an additional treatment with five-sellers in one study. The results show that average complexity created by a seller is not different for the treatments with two, three and five sellers. In addition, market prices are highest and buyer surplus is lowest when there are two sellers in a market.     

Inventory management with random supply and imperfect information: A hidden Markov model

In most of the papers on inventory models operating in a random environment, the state of the environment in each period is assumed to be fully observed with perfect information. However, this assumption is not realistic in most real-life situations and we provide a remedy in this paper by assuming that the environment is only partially observed with imperfect information. We accomplish this by analyzing two formulations of single-item models with periodic-review and random supply in a random environment. In the first one, supply is random due to random capacity of production and random availability of transportation. We show that state-dependent base-stock policy is optimal if the capacity and all costs are observed, while demand and availability are unobserved. In the second model, we consider a model with random availability only with fixed-ordering cost. We show that state-dependent (s,S) policy is optimal if the availability process is observable.     

The US Current Account Deficit: Stocktaking and Remedies

In 2004, the US current account deficit widened to US $668.1 billion and 5.7 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP). These numbers, unprecedented both in absolute and relative terms, have led many observers to doubt the stability of the status quo. To avoid a major crisis resulting from a disorderly adjustment, questions must be answered concerning appropriate policy initiatives to ensure a more benign correction of external imbalances.      

Complexity and biases

We examine experimentally how complexity affects decision-making, when individuals choose among different products with varying benefits and costs. We find that complexity in costs leads to choosing a high-benefit product, with high costs and overall lower payoffs. In contrast, when complexity is in the benefits of the product, we cannot reject the hypothesis of random mistakes. We also examine the role of heterogeneous complexity. We find that individuals still (mistakenly) choose the high-benefit but costly product, even if cheaper and simple products are available. Our results suggest that salience is a main driver of choices under different forms of complexity.     

Buyer confusion and market prices

We employ a price setting duopoly experiment to examine whether buyer confusion increases market prices. Each seller offers a good to buyers who have homogeneous preferences. Sellers decide on the number of attributes of their good and set prices. The number of attributes bears no cost to the sellers and does not affect the value of the good to the buyers but adds complexity to buyers’ evaluation of the goods. The experimental results indicate that the buyers make more suboptimal choices and that prices are higher when the number of attributes of the goods is higher. Moreover, prices and profits are higher than those in a benchmark treatment with perfectly rational (robot) buyers.