This paper considers the diverse public good characteristics of COVID-19 activities along with their strategic implications. The underlying aggregator technologies, which relate individual contributions to the amount consumed, affect the prognosis for the supply of COVID-related activities. Weakest-link activities assume a particularly pivotal role in curbing the spread of COVID-19. For instance, the propagation of COVID-19 through new strains is disproportionately influenced by those countries with the smallest vaccination rates or least isolation actions. Diverse income distribution among at-risk countries raises the need to “shore up” weakest-link countries’ provision to lift global supply. Generally, shoring-up actions result in a Prisoner’s Dilemma with unfavorable collective action prospects. As the number of countries requiring shoring up increases, the less favorable is the prospect for addressing provision shortfalls. Also, as the number of capable countries to do the shoring up increases, the prospect for successful action diminishes. The paper also examines the strategic implications of other aggregators—e.g., best shot and better shot—associated with COVID-inhibiting actions. To address best-shot anti-COVID actions, countries must pool or coordinate actions to meet a threshold. A host of institutions—e.g., the World Health Organization or public-private partnerships—can facilitate shoring-up weakest-link activities or coordinating best-shot actions.
{"title":"COVID-19 Activities: Publicness and Strategic Concerns","authors":"T. Sandler","doi":"10.3390/g14010007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g14010007","url":null,"abstract":"This paper considers the diverse public good characteristics of COVID-19 activities along with their strategic implications. The underlying aggregator technologies, which relate individual contributions to the amount consumed, affect the prognosis for the supply of COVID-related activities. Weakest-link activities assume a particularly pivotal role in curbing the spread of COVID-19. For instance, the propagation of COVID-19 through new strains is disproportionately influenced by those countries with the smallest vaccination rates or least isolation actions. Diverse income distribution among at-risk countries raises the need to “shore up” weakest-link countries’ provision to lift global supply. Generally, shoring-up actions result in a Prisoner’s Dilemma with unfavorable collective action prospects. As the number of countries requiring shoring up increases, the less favorable is the prospect for addressing provision shortfalls. Also, as the number of capable countries to do the shoring up increases, the prospect for successful action diminishes. The paper also examines the strategic implications of other aggregators—e.g., best shot and better shot—associated with COVID-inhibiting actions. To address best-shot anti-COVID actions, countries must pool or coordinate actions to meet a threshold. A host of institutions—e.g., the World Health Organization or public-private partnerships—can facilitate shoring-up weakest-link activities or coordinating best-shot actions.","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"14 1","pages":"7"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44885927","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Ignoring strategic interactions among final goods producers, the extant theoretical literature shows that lower costs of imported inputs increase the exports of the final goods using those inputs. Hence, it does not explain the empirically relevant positive relationship between the costs of imported inputs and the export of the final goods. We use a simple Cournot duopoly (i.e., duopoly quantity competition) with homogeneous products to show that if the exporters differ in input coefficients, lower costs of imported inputs may increase or decrease the exports of the final goods. Thus, we argue that strategic interdependence among the exporters can be an important factor for the positive relationship between lower costs of imported inputs and the export of the final goods. We further show that a lower cost of imported inputs may reduce the consumer surplus, total profits of the exporters, and world welfare. We also show the implications of a Bertrand duopoly (i.e., duopoly price competition) with horizontal product differentiation for our analysis.
{"title":"The Connection between Imported Inputs and Exports: The Importance of Strategic Interdependence","authors":"A. Mukherjee, Yao Liu","doi":"10.3390/g14010006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g14010006","url":null,"abstract":"Ignoring strategic interactions among final goods producers, the extant theoretical literature shows that lower costs of imported inputs increase the exports of the final goods using those inputs. Hence, it does not explain the empirically relevant positive relationship between the costs of imported inputs and the export of the final goods. We use a simple Cournot duopoly (i.e., duopoly quantity competition) with homogeneous products to show that if the exporters differ in input coefficients, lower costs of imported inputs may increase or decrease the exports of the final goods. Thus, we argue that strategic interdependence among the exporters can be an important factor for the positive relationship between lower costs of imported inputs and the export of the final goods. We further show that a lower cost of imported inputs may reduce the consumer surplus, total profits of the exporters, and world welfare. We also show the implications of a Bertrand duopoly (i.e., duopoly price competition) with horizontal product differentiation for our analysis.","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"14 1","pages":"6"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48310823","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
First and foremost, pre-registration is not the all-in-one solution for experimental economics [...]
首先,预注册并不是实验经济学的一体化解决方案〔…〕
{"title":"Pre-Registration in Experimental Economics: An Editorial Policy","authors":"H. Nax","doi":"10.3390/g14010005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g14010005","url":null,"abstract":"First and foremost, pre-registration is not the all-in-one solution for experimental economics [...]","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"14 1","pages":"5"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45163074","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
A multi-tournament environment is analyzed, focusing on the impact of organizer market structure on agent entry behavior. Two high ability agents first decide which tournament to enter (with fields then filled by low ability agents). If the marginal benefit of high ability agents in an event is weakly increasing, a monopsonist organizer sets prizes so that the high ability agents enter the same event. If this marginal benefit is diminishing, a monopsonist organizer will either: always set prizes for which the high ability agents enter different events; or set prizes for which the high ability agents enter different events if and only if the difference in ability between the high ability and low ability agents is sufficiently small. Sequentially competing organizers set prizes for which both high ability agents enter the same event if and only if the marginal benefit of having two high ability agents in one event is relatively large. For competing organizers there may be either a first or second mover advantage. Finally, Social Welfare may be higher or lower with competing organizers, implying greater organizer competition does not necessarily increase Social Welfare. Parallels are noted throughout to the labor market for professional golfers both over years when the PGA TOUR was essentially a monopsonist and more recently when LIV Golf emerged as a competitor.
{"title":"The Impact of Organizer Market Structure on Participant Entry Behavior in a Multi-Tournament Environment","authors":"Timothy Mathews, S. Namoro, James W. Boudreau","doi":"10.3390/g14010004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g14010004","url":null,"abstract":"A multi-tournament environment is analyzed, focusing on the impact of organizer market structure on agent entry behavior. Two high ability agents first decide which tournament to enter (with fields then filled by low ability agents). If the marginal benefit of high ability agents in an event is weakly increasing, a monopsonist organizer sets prizes so that the high ability agents enter the same event. If this marginal benefit is diminishing, a monopsonist organizer will either: always set prizes for which the high ability agents enter different events; or set prizes for which the high ability agents enter different events if and only if the difference in ability between the high ability and low ability agents is sufficiently small. Sequentially competing organizers set prizes for which both high ability agents enter the same event if and only if the marginal benefit of having two high ability agents in one event is relatively large. For competing organizers there may be either a first or second mover advantage. Finally, Social Welfare may be higher or lower with competing organizers, implying greater organizer competition does not necessarily increase Social Welfare. Parallels are noted throughout to the labor market for professional golfers both over years when the PGA TOUR was essentially a monopsonist and more recently when LIV Golf emerged as a competitor.","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"14 1","pages":"4"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46626116","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Ad-Valorem Taxes, Prices and Content Diversification in the News Market","authors":"A. Pires","doi":"10.3390/g14020025","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g14020025","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"14 1","pages":"25"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"69970989","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper examines a homogeneous-good Bertrand–Edgeworth oligopoly model to explore the role of firm size and number in pricing. We consider the price impact of merger, break up, investment, divestment, entry and exit. A merger leads to higher prices only when it increases the size of the largest seller and industry capacity is neither too big nor too small post-merger. Similarly, breaking up a firm only leads to lower prices when it concerns the biggest producer and aggregate capacity is within an intermediate range. Investment and entry (weakly) reduce prices, whereas divestment and exit yield (weakly) higher prices. Taken together, these findings suggest that size matters more than number in the determination of oligopoly prices.
{"title":"Oligopoly Pricing: The Role of Firm Size and Number","authors":"Iwan Bos, Marco A. Marini","doi":"10.3390/g14010003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g14010003","url":null,"abstract":"This paper examines a homogeneous-good Bertrand–Edgeworth oligopoly model to explore the role of firm size and number in pricing. We consider the price impact of merger, break up, investment, divestment, entry and exit. A merger leads to higher prices only when it increases the size of the largest seller and industry capacity is neither too big nor too small post-merger. Similarly, breaking up a firm only leads to lower prices when it concerns the biggest producer and aggregate capacity is within an intermediate range. Investment and entry (weakly) reduce prices, whereas divestment and exit yield (weakly) higher prices. Taken together, these findings suggest that size matters more than number in the determination of oligopoly prices.","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"14 1","pages":"3"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47094792","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper tries to prove that the outcomes stemming from interactions on assignment markets bring about coordination in case of a stochastic matching subject to various forms of expectations. We consider an exchange network with stochastic matching between the pairs of players and analyze the dynamics of bargaining in such a market. The cases of convergent expectations, divergent expectations and of social preferences are studied. The extension of earlier works lies in the consideration of a stochastic matching on a graph dependent on the weights of edges. The results show that, in all three cases, the dynamics converges rapidly to the generalized Nash bargaining solution, which is an equilibrium that combines notions of stability and fairness. In the first two scenarios, the numerical simulations reveal that the convergence toward a fixed point is speedily achieved at the value of the outside option. In the third scenario, the fixed point promptly converges to the value of the outside option supplemented by the surplus share.
{"title":"Exchange Networks with Stochastic Matching","authors":"A. Dragicevic","doi":"10.3390/g14010002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g14010002","url":null,"abstract":"This paper tries to prove that the outcomes stemming from interactions on assignment markets bring about coordination in case of a stochastic matching subject to various forms of expectations. We consider an exchange network with stochastic matching between the pairs of players and analyze the dynamics of bargaining in such a market. The cases of convergent expectations, divergent expectations and of social preferences are studied. The extension of earlier works lies in the consideration of a stochastic matching on a graph dependent on the weights of edges. The results show that, in all three cases, the dynamics converges rapidly to the generalized Nash bargaining solution, which is an equilibrium that combines notions of stability and fairness. In the first two scenarios, the numerical simulations reveal that the convergence toward a fixed point is speedily achieved at the value of the outside option. In the third scenario, the fixed point promptly converges to the value of the outside option supplemented by the surplus share.","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"14 1","pages":"2"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-12-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46849655","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
R. Andrade, Iván Ortiz-Garcés, María Cazares, Gustavo Navas, María Isabel Sánchez-Pazmiño
The growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) has accelerated digital transformation processes in organizations and cities. However, it has also opened new security challenges due to the complexity and dynamism of these systems. The application of security risk analysis methodologies used to evaluate information technology (IT) systems have their limitations to qualitatively assess the security risks in IoT systems, due to the lack of historical data and the dynamic behavior of the solutions based on the IoT. The objective of this study is to propose a methodology for developing a security risk analysis using scenarios based on the risk factors of IoT devices. In order to manage the uncertainty due to the dynamics of IoT behaviors, we propose the use of Bayesian networks in conjunction with the Best Worst Method (BWM) for multi-criteria decision-making to obtain a quantitative security risk value.
{"title":"Defining Cyber Risk Scenarios to Evaluate IoT Systems","authors":"R. Andrade, Iván Ortiz-Garcés, María Cazares, Gustavo Navas, María Isabel Sánchez-Pazmiño","doi":"10.3390/g14010001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g14010001","url":null,"abstract":"The growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) has accelerated digital transformation processes in organizations and cities. However, it has also opened new security challenges due to the complexity and dynamism of these systems. The application of security risk analysis methodologies used to evaluate information technology (IT) systems have their limitations to qualitatively assess the security risks in IoT systems, due to the lack of historical data and the dynamic behavior of the solutions based on the IoT. The objective of this study is to propose a methodology for developing a security risk analysis using scenarios based on the risk factors of IoT devices. In order to manage the uncertainty due to the dynamics of IoT behaviors, we propose the use of Bayesian networks in conjunction with the Best Worst Method (BWM) for multi-criteria decision-making to obtain a quantitative security risk value.","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"14 1","pages":"1"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42834446","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
We investigate observed rent dissipation—the ratio of the total costs of rent seeking to the monetary value of the rent—in winner-take-all and share contests, where preferences are more general than usually assumed in the literature. With concave valuation of the rent, we find that contests can exhibit observed over-dissipation if the contested rent is below a threshold and yet observed under-dissipation with large rents: the nature of preferences implies contestants are relatively effortful in contesting small rents. Considering more general preferences in contests thus allows us to reconcile the Tullock paradox—where rent-seeking levels are relatively small despite the contested rent being sizeable—with observed over-dissipation of rents in experimental settings, where contested rents are arguably small.
{"title":"Rent Dissipation in Simple Tullock Contests","authors":"Alex Dickson, I. MacKenzie, Petros G. Sekeris","doi":"10.3390/g13060083","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g13060083","url":null,"abstract":"We investigate observed rent dissipation—the ratio of the total costs of rent seeking to the monetary value of the rent—in winner-take-all and share contests, where preferences are more general than usually assumed in the literature. With concave valuation of the rent, we find that contests can exhibit observed over-dissipation if the contested rent is below a threshold and yet observed under-dissipation with large rents: the nature of preferences implies contestants are relatively effortful in contesting small rents. Considering more general preferences in contests thus allows us to reconcile the Tullock paradox—where rent-seeking levels are relatively small despite the contested rent being sizeable—with observed over-dissipation of rents in experimental settings, where contested rents are arguably small.","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"13 1","pages":"83"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-12-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42704746","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The subject of this study is an oligopolistic market in which three firms operate in an environment of quantitative competition known as the Cournot oligopoly model. Firms and their production are differentiated, which brings the theoretical model closer to real market conditions. The main objective was to expand the Cournot duopoly and add another firm, resulting in an oligopolistic market structure assuming a partially differentiated production and coalition strategy between two firms. This article contains an oligopolistic model specifically designed for three different types of expectations, and has been applied to find and verify the stability of the net equilibrium of oligopolists. The market of telecommunication operators in Slovakia was selected as a real market case with accessible data on an oligopoly with three companies and partial differentiation. There are studies in which the authors limit their considerations to a certain number of repetitions of oligopolistic games. An infinite time interval is considered here. Three types of future expectations were considered: a simple dynamic model (or naïve expectations) in which the oligopolist assumes that its competitors will behave in the future based on their response functions, an adaptive expectations model in which the oligopolist considers a weighted average of the quantities offered by its competitors, and real expectations in which firms behave as rational players and do not have complete information about demand and offer output based on expected marginal profit. While the presented model proved to be stable under naïve and adaptive expectations, no stable equilibrium was found under real expectations and further results indicate a chaotic behavior.
{"title":"Cournot's Oligopoly Equilibrium under Different Expectations and Differentiated Production","authors":"Nora Grisáková, Peter Štetka","doi":"10.3390/g13060082","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/g13060082","url":null,"abstract":"The subject of this study is an oligopolistic market in which three firms operate in an environment of quantitative competition known as the Cournot oligopoly model. Firms and their production are differentiated, which brings the theoretical model closer to real market conditions. The main objective was to expand the Cournot duopoly and add another firm, resulting in an oligopolistic market structure assuming a partially differentiated production and coalition strategy between two firms. This article contains an oligopolistic model specifically designed for three different types of expectations, and has been applied to find and verify the stability of the net equilibrium of oligopolists. The market of telecommunication operators in Slovakia was selected as a real market case with accessible data on an oligopoly with three companies and partial differentiation. There are studies in which the authors limit their considerations to a certain number of repetitions of oligopolistic games. An infinite time interval is considered here. Three types of future expectations were considered: a simple dynamic model (or naïve expectations) in which the oligopolist assumes that its competitors will behave in the future based on their response functions, an adaptive expectations model in which the oligopolist considers a weighted average of the quantities offered by its competitors, and real expectations in which firms behave as rational players and do not have complete information about demand and offer output based on expected marginal profit. While the presented model proved to be stable under naïve and adaptive expectations, no stable equilibrium was found under real expectations and further results indicate a chaotic behavior.","PeriodicalId":35065,"journal":{"name":"Games","volume":"13 1","pages":"82"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-12-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43327645","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}