BIOECONOMICS OF SUSTAINABLE HARVEST OF COMPETING SPECIES: A COMMENT

Flaaten’s (1991) study on competing species conjectures that a higher price (harvesting costs) of one species yields a lower (greater) own stock-size and a greater (lower) stock-size of the competing species. I show both conjectures are wrong.fishery management, multiple species model, renewable resources

BIDDING STRATEGIES OF SEQUENTIAL FIRST PRICE AUCTIONS PROGRAMMED BY EXPERIENCED BIDDERS

This paper considers bidding automata programmed by experienced subjects in sequential first price sealed bid auction experiments. These automata play against each other in computer tournaments. The risk neutral subgame perfect Nash equilibrium strategy of the independent private value model serves as a benchmark. The equilibrium strategy does not describe any of the heterogeneous automata programs submitted by subjects and does not always perform better than average in the tournament.Experimental Economics, First-Price Sealed-Bid Auctions, Sequential Auctions, Independent Private Value Model, Finite Automata

An experimental investigation of collusion in hard-close auctions: partners and friends

We study collusion in the finitely repeated, hard-close auction experiment. Three subjects, identified by their bidder name, simultaneously compete in three auction markets. Due to the experimental design, subjects are enabled to the sharing of the benefits of cooperation by coordinating their individual demands. Similar collusive behavior has been suggested to play an important role in empirical markets (Klemperer 2002). We consider two treatments. In the first one, the partners treatment, subjects who are identified by bidder-names interact repeatedly but anonymously with each other. In the second one, the friends treatment, groups of three subjects who participate together in the experiment, interact repeatedly with another. In the experiment, we do not observe tacit collusion in the partners treatment; the outcome is efficient and prices converge quickly to the rational equilibrium prediction. Only in the friends treatment, cooperation gains can be realized, but much less cooperation is observed than one would imagine. We conclude that in the laboratory, cooperation is difficult to achieve in the hard-close auction market if anonymity prevails.multi unit auctions, collusion, experimental economics

THEORY AND MISBEHAVIOR OF FIRST-PRICE AUCTIONS: THE IMPORTANCE OF INFORMATION FEEDBACK IN EXPERIMENTAL MARKETS

This article reports the results of a market experiment designed to test the predictions of the constant relative risk aversion model and to study the importance of information feedback in repeated first-price sealed-bid auctions. The data reveal that introduction of price information feedback implies a significant change of individual behavior. Without price information feedback, the data support the risk neutral Nash equilibrium prediction; with price information feedback, on the other hand, subjects overbid the risk neutral Nash equilibrium significantly. The constant relative risk aversion model is rejected since it predicts overbidding for both feedback conditions.Experimental Economics, First-price Sealed-bid Auctions, Independent Private Value Model, Bidding Theory, Risk Aversion

Individual Behavior of First-Price Sealed-Bid Auctions: The Importance of Information Feedback in Experimental Markets

This article reports the results of a first-price sealed-bid auction experiment, which has been designed to test the Nash equilibrium predictions of individual bidding behavior. Subjects faced in 100 auctions always the same resale value and competed with computerized bids. Three treatments were considered which varied with the conditions of information feedback. In earlier experimental work an overbidding above the risk neutral Nash equilibrium has been frequently reported. Our data provide evidence that this overbidding regularity can be a consequence of the standard information feedback in auction experiments of revealing only the winning bid after each auction. By means of learning direction theory we explain the individual bidding dynamics. Finally we apply impulse balance theory and make long run predictions of the individual bidding behavior.Experimental economics, first-price sealed-bid auctions, independent private value model, computerized competitors, bidding theory, risk aversion

Bioeconomics of Sustainable Harvest of Competing Species: A Comment

We refer to Flaaten’s (JEEM 1991, pp. 163–80) study on competing species. In Theorem 5 (Theorem 6), Flaaten claims that a higher price (harvesting costs) of one species yields a lower (greater) own stock-size and a greater (lower) stock-size of the competing species in the steady state. It is shown that both claims are wrong.Renewable resources, fishery management, multiple species model, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy, D62, D99, Q22,

Bidding strategies of sequential first price auctions programmed by experienced bidders

This paper considers bidding automata programmed by experienced subjects in sequential first price sealed bid auction experiments. These automata play against each other in computer tournaments. The risk neutral subgame perfect Nash equilibrium strategy of the independent private value model serves as a benchmark. The equilibrium strategy does not describe any of the heterogeneous automata programs submitted by subjects and does not always perform better than average in the tournament

Bidding at Sequential First-Price Auctions with(out) Supply Uncertainty: A Laboratory Analysis

We report on a series of experiments that test the effects of an uncertain supply on the formation of bids and prices in sequential first-price auctions with private-independent values and unit-demands. Supply is assumed uncertain when buyers do not know the exact number of units to be sold (i.e., the length of the sequence). Although we observe a non-monotone behavior when supply is certain and an important overbidding, the data qualitatively support our price trend predictions and the risk neutral Nash equilibrium model of bidding for the last stage of a sequence, whether supply is certain or not. Our study shows that behavior in these markets changes significantly with the presence of an uncertain supply, and that it can be explained by assuming that bidders formulate pessimistic beliefs about the occurrence of another stage.sequential first-price auctions, independent private values, unit-demand, supply uncertainty, bidding behavior, price trends, experimental economics

AN EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS OF CONDITIONAL COOPERATION

Experimental and empirical evidence identifies the existence of socialpreferences and proposes competing models of such preferences. In this paper, wefurther examine one such social preference: conditional cooperation. We run threeexperimental public goods games, the traditional voluntary contribution mechanism(VCM, also called the linear public goods game), the weak-link mechanism (WLM) andthe best-shot mechanism (BSM). We then analyze the existence and types ofconditional cooperation observed. We find that participants are responsive to the pastcontributions of others in all three games, but are most responsive to differentcontributions in each game: the median in the VCM, the minimum in the WLM and themaximum in the BSM. We conclude by discussing implications of these differences forbehavior in these three mechanisms. This paper thus refines our notions of conditionalcooperation to allow for different types of public good production functions and byextension, other contexts.experimental economics, conditional cooperation, public goods

How politicians make decisions under risk: a political choice experiment

We report on an experimental study with real-world politicians. These political experts face political choice problems under risk and probability. Thus, we test the frequently observed violations of rational choice theory -the reference point effect, loss aversion, framing effects, and the common ratio effect- with experts from the field. Their choices violate expected utility theory. Nevertheless, they appear to be more rational and less risk averse (loving) in the domain of gains (losses) than student subjects.Subject-pool effect; experts; expected utility; prospect theory.