Weighted Congestion Games With Separable Preferences

Players in a congestion game may differ from one another in their intrinsic preferences (e.g., the benefit they get from using a specific resource), their contribution to congestion, or both. In many cases of interest, intrinsic preferences and the negative effect of congestion are (additively or multiplicatively) separable. This paper considers the implications of separability for the existence of pure-strategy Nash equilibrium and the prospects of spontaneous convergence to equilibrium. It is shown that these properties may or may not be guaranteed, depending on the exact nature of player heterogeneity.congestion games, separable preferences, pure equilibrium, finite improvement property, potential.

Demystifying the 'Metric Approach to Social Compromise with the Unanimity Criterion'

In a recent book and earlier studies, Donald Saari well clarifies the source of three classical impossibility theorems in social choice and proposes possible escape out of these negative results. The objective of this note is to illustrate the relevance of these explanations in justifying the metric approach to the social compromise with the unanimity criterion.social choice, impossibility theorems, metric approach to compromise with the unanimity criterion

Legal Tender

The legal foundation of the monetary system is the law of legal tender. The “legal tender” concept is used in models to describe almost anything except for what it really means in actual laws. Such errors prevent an accurate evaluation of the importance of this legal status. This note explains in simple terms what “legal tender” really means.Legal tender; Contract law; Taxes

Price Setting and Price Adjustment in Some European Union Countries: Introduction to the Special Issue

This introductory essay briefly summarizes the eleven empirical studies of price setting and price adjustment that are included in this special issue. The studies, which use data from several European countries, were conducted as part of the European Central Bank’s Inflation Persistence Network.Price Rigidity, Price Flexibility, Cost of Price Adjustment, Menu Cost, Managerial and Customer Cost of Price Adjustment, Pricing, Price System, Price Setting, New Keynesian Economics, Store-Level Data, Micro-Level Data, Product-Level Data

The Impact of Insider Trading on Forecasting in a Bookmakers' Horse Betting Market

This paper considers the impact of insider trading on forecasting in a betting market when prices are set by bookmakers. We base our analysis on Schnytzer, Lamers and Makropoulou (2008) who showed that inside trading in the 1997-1998 Australian racetrack betting market represents somewhere between 20 and 30 percent of all trading in this market. They show that the presence of insiders leads opening prices to deviate from true winning probabilities. Under these circumstances, forecasting of race outcomes should take into account an estimate of the extent of insider trading per horse. We show that the added value of a measure of insider trading for profitable betting is sufficient to reduce the losses when only prices are taken into account. Since the only variables taken into account in either Schnytzer, Lamers and Makropoulou (2008) or this paper are price data, this is tantamount to a demonstration that the market is weak-form efficient.

Après nous le Déluge: Fertility and the Intensity of Struggle against Immigration

This paper is inspired by a puzzling empirical fact that despite the importance of controlling migration for their future, the host countries allocate very limited amounts of resources to the struggle against illegal immigration. The present model analyzes this issue in the context of low fertility in the host countries and suggests a novel channel though which the intensity of the struggle against immigration can be related to fertility. The analysis shows that for childless individuals, who have no reason to care about the future, it is optimal to contribute less to the costly immigration-prevention measures.immigration, border enforcing, low fertility

Attitudes to Risk and Roulette

We present an empirical framework for determining whether or not customers at the roulette wheel are risk averse or risk loving. Thus, we present a summary of the Aumann-Serrano (2007) risk index as generalized to allow for the presence of risk lovers by Schnytzer and Westreich (2010). We show that, for any gamble, whereas riskiness increases for gambles with positive expected return as the amount placed on a given gamble is increased, the opposite is the case for gambles with negative expected return. Since roulette involves binary gambles, we restrict our attention to such gambles exclusively and derive empirically testable hypotheses. In particular, we show that, all other things being equal, for gambles with a negative expected return, riskiness decreases as the size of the contingent payout increases. On the other hand, riskiness increases if the gamble has a positive expected return. We also prove that, for positive return gambles, riskiness increases, ceteris paribus, in the variance of the gamble while the reverse is true for gambles with negative expected returns. Finally, we apply these results to the specific gambles involved in American roulette and discuss how we might distinguish between casino visitors who are risk averse and those who are risk loving as well as those who may suffer from gambling addictions of one form or another.

Shorting the Bear: A Test of Anecdotal Evidence of Insider Trading in Early Stages of the Sub-Prime Market Crisis

This article uses trading data in the options market for shares in The Bear Sterns Companies (BSC) during the early stages of the US sub-prime crisis as a laboratory to examine the incidence of insider trading. We take the perspective of a regulator making use of hindsight to identify the most propitious periods for insider trades and to identify market activity indicative of insiders. Half the value of options traded were on 19 percent of the days, mostly in contracts in or close-to the money and near to expiry. We find persuasive evidence that insiders could have been active in trading Bear Sterns stock during this period.insider trading, forensic finance, Bear Sterns

Interactions Between Local and Migrant Workers at the Workplace

In this paper we consider the interaction between local workers and migrants in the production process of a firm. Both local workers and migrants can invest effort in assimilation activities in order to increase the assimilation of the migrants into the firm and so by increase their interaction and production activities. We consider the effect, the relative size (in the firm) of each group and the cost of activities, has on the assimilation process of the migrants.Assimilation; Contracts; Ethnicity; Market Structure; Networks; Harassment