We analyze the actual behavior of agents in a matching mechanism, using data from a clearinghouse at the Faculty of Business Administration and Economics at a German university, where a variant of the Boston mechanism is used. We supplement this data with data generated in a survey among the students who participated in the clearinghouse. We find that under the current mechanism over 74% of students act strategically by misrepresenting at least one of their preferences. Nevertheless, not all students are able to improve their outcome by doing so. We show that this is mainly due to the incomplete information of students and naiveté. Sophisticated students actually reach significantly better outcomes than naive students. Thus, we find evidence that naive students are exploited by sophisticated students in an incomplete information setting.

This study examines the gender gap in competitiveness in an educational setting and tests whether this gap depends on the difficulty of the task at hand. For this purpose, we administered a series of experiments during the final exam of a university course. We confronted three cohorts of undergraduate students with a set of bonus questions and the choice between an absolute and a tournament grading scheme for these questions. To test the moderating impact of task difficulty, we (randomly) varied the difficulty of the questions between treatment groups. We find that, on average, women are significantly less likely to select the tournament scheme. However, the results show that the gender gap in tournament entry is sizable when the questions are relative easy, but much smaller and statistical insignificant when the questions are difficult.

Many countries have opened their health care markets to private for-profit providers, aiming to promote quality and choice for patients. The prices are regulated and providers compete in location and quality. We show that whereas opening a public hospital market typically raises quality, the private provider strategically locates towards the corner of the market to avoid costly quality competition. Social welfare depends on the size of the regulator's budget and on the altruism of the public provider. If the budget is large, high quality results and welfare is highest in a duopoly whenever entry is optimal. If the budget is small, quality levels in a duopoly mirror the quality level in a monopoly. It can be optimal for the regulator not to use the full budget.

Models on network formation have often been extended to include the potential of network disruption in recent years. Whereas the theoretical research on network formation under the threat of disruption has thus gained prominence, hardly any experimental research exists so far. In this paper, we therefore experimentally study the emergence of networks including the aspect of a known external threat by relating theoretical predictions by Dzuibiński and Goyal (2013) to actual observed behaviour. We deal with the question if subjects in the role of a strategic Designer are able to form safe networks for least costs while facing a strategic Adversary who is going to attack their networks. Varying the costs for protecting nodes, we designed and tested two treatments with different predictions for the equilibrium network and investigated whether one of the least cost equilibrium networks was more likely to be reached. Furthermore, the influence of the subjects’ farsightedness on their decision-making process was elicited and analysed. We find that while subjects are able to build safe networks in both treatments, equilibrium networks are only built in one of the two treatments. In the other treatment, predominantly safe networks are built but they are not for least costs. Additionally, we find that farsightedness –as measured in our experiment– has no influence on whether subjects are able to build safe or least cost equilibrium networks. Two robustness settings with a reduced external threat or more liberties to modify the initial networks qualitatively confirm our results. Overall, in this experiment observed behaviour is only partially in line with the theoretical predictions by Dzuibiński and Goyal (2013).

Social psychology studies the "common enemy effect", the phenomenon that members of a group work together when they face an opponent, although they otherwise have little in common. An interesting scenario is the formation of an information network where group members individually sponsor costly links. Suppose that ceteris paribus, an outsider appears who aims to disrupt the information flow within the network by deleting some of the links. The question is how the group responds to this common enemy. We address this question for the homogeneous connections model of strategic network formation, with two-way flow of information and without information decay. For sufficiently low linkage costs, the external threat can lead to a more connected network, a positive common enemy effect. For very high but not prohibitively high linkage costs, the equilibrium network can be minimally connected and efficient in the absence of the external threat whereas it is always empty and inefficient in the presence of the external threat, a negative common enemy effect. For intermediate linkage costs, both connected networks and the empty network are Nash for certain cost ranges.

We investigate the degree of price competition among telecommunication firms. Underlying a Bertrand model of price competition, we empirically model pricing behaviour in an oligopoly. We analyse panel data of individual pricing information of mobile phone contracts offered between 2011 and 2017. We provide empirical evidence that price differences as well as reputational effects serve as a signal to buyers and significantly affect market demand. Additionally, we find that brands lead to an increase in demand and thus are able to generate spillover effects even after price increase.

In our model two divisions negotiate over type-dependent contracts to determine an intrafirm transfer price for an intermediate product. Since the upstream division's (seller's) costs and downstream division's (buyer's) revenues are supposed to be private information, we formally consider cooperative bargaining problems under incomplete information. This means that the two divisions consider allocations of expected utility generated by mechanisms that satisfy (interim) individual rationality, incentive compatibility and/or ex post efficiency. Assuming two possible types for buyer and seller each, we first establish that the bargaining problem is regular, regardless whether or not incentive and/or efficiency constraints are imposed. This allows us to apply the generalized Nash bargaining solution to determine fair transfer payments and transfer quantities. In particular, the generalized Nash bargaining solution tries to balance divisional profits, while incentive constraints are still in place. In that sense a fair profit division is generated. Furthermore, by means of illustrative examples we derive general properties of this solution for the transfer pricing problem and compare the model developed here with the models existing in the literature. We demonstrate that there is a tradeoff between ex post efficiency and fairness.

In Internet transactions, customers and service providers often interact once and anonymously. To prevent deceptive behavior a reputation system is particularly important to reduce information asymmetries about the quality of the offered product or service. In this study we examine the effectiveness of a reputation system to reduce information asymmetries when customers may make mistakes in judging the provided service quality. In our model, a service provider makes strategic quality choices and short-lived customers are asked to evaluate the observed quality by providing ratings to a reputation system. The customer is not able to always evaluate the service quality correctly and possibly submits an erroneous rating according to a predefined probability. Considering reputation profiles of the last three sales, within the theoretical model we derive that the service provider’s dichotomous quality decisions are independent of the reputation profile and depend only on the probabilities of receiving positive and negative ratings when providing low or high quality. Thus, a service provider optimally either maintains a good reputation or completely refrains from any reputation building process. However, when mapping our theoretical model to an experimental design we find that a significant share of subjects in the role of the service provider deviates from optimal behavior and chooses actions which are conditional on the current reputation profile. With respect to these individual quality choices we see that subjects use milking strategies which means that they exploit a good reputation. In particular, if the sales price is high, low quality is delivered until the price drops below a certain threshold, and then high quality is chosen until the price increases again.

We present a game-theoretic model of the repression–dissent nexus, focusing on preemptive repression. A small group of instigating dissidents triggers a protest if each dissident participates. The dissidents face random checks by security forces, and when an individual dissident is caught while preparing to participate, he or she is prevented from doing so. Each dissident can invest in countermeasures, which make checks ineffective. For large benefits of protest, higher preemptive repression in the form of a higher number of checks has a deterrence effect and makes dissidents less prone to invest in countermeasures, decreasing the probability of protest. For small benefits of protest, higher preemptive repression instead has a backfiring effect. Both myopic and farsighted governments avoid the backfiring effect by setting low levels of preemptive repression (velvet-glove strategy). However, only a farsighted government is able to exploit the deterrence effect by maintaining a high level of preemptive repression (iron-fist strategy).

We explore how competition between physicians affects medical service provision. Previous research has shown that, without competition, physicians deviate from patient‐optimal treatment under payment systems like capitation and fee‐for‐service. Although competition might reduce these distortions, physicians usually interact with each other repeatedly over time and only a fraction of patients switches providers at all. Both patterns might prevent competition to work in the desired direction. To analyze the behavioral effects of competition, we develop a theoretical benchmark that is then tested in a controlled laboratory experiment. Experimental conditions vary physician payment and patient characteristics. Real patients benefit from provision decisions made in the experiment. Our results reveal that, in line with the theoretical prediction, introducing competition can reduce overprovision and underprovision, respectively. The observed effects depend on patient characteristics and the payment system, though. Tacit collusion is observed and particularly pronounced with fee‐for‐service payment, but it appears to be less frequent than in related experimental research on price competition.

We study a game between a network designer, who uses costly links to connect nodes in a network, and a network disruptor who tries to disrupt the resulting network as much as possible by deleting either nodes or links. For low linking costs networks with all nodes in symmetric positions are a best response of the designer under both link deletion and node deletion. For high linking costs the designer builds a star network under link deletion, but for node deletion excludes some nodes from the network to build a smaller but stronger network. For intermediate linking costs the designer again builds a symmetric network under node deletion but a star‐like network with weak spots under link deletion.

We construct two-player two-strategy game-theoretic models of by-product mutualism, where our focus lies on the way in which the probability of cooperation among players is affected by the degree of adversity facing the players. In our first model, cooperation consists of the production of a public good, and adversity is linked to the degree of complementarity of the players׳ efforts in producing the public good. In our second model, cooperation consists of the defense of a public, and/or a private good with by-product benefits, and adversity is measured by the number of random attacks (e.g., by a predator) facing the players. In both of these models, our analysis confirms the existence of the so-called boomerang effect, which states that in a harsh environment, the individual player has few incentives to unilaterally defect in a situation of joint cooperation. Focusing on such an effect in isolation leads to the "common-enemy" hypothesis that a larger degree of adversity increases the probability of cooperation. Yet, we also find that a sucker effect may simultaneously exist, which says that in a harsh environment, the individual player has few incentives to unilaterally cooperate in a situation of joint defection. Looked at in isolation, the sucker effect leads to the competing hypothesis that a larger degree of adversity decreases the probability of cooperation. Our analysis predicts circumstances in which the "common enemy" hypothesis prevails, and circumstances in which the competing hypothesis prevails.

On an intermediate goods market with asymmetric production technologies as well as vertical and horizontal product differentiation we analyze the influence of simultaneous competition for resources and customers. The intermediaries face either price or quantity competition on the output market and a monopolistic, strategically acting supplier on the input market. We find that there exist quality and productivity differences such that for quantity competition only one intermediary is willing to procure inputs from the input supplier, while for price competition both intermediaries are willing to purchase inputs. Moreover, the well-known welfare advantage of price competition can in general be no longer confirmed in our model with an endogenous input market and asymmetric intermediaries.

In the framework of spatial competition, two or more players strategically choose a locationin order to attract consumers. It is assumed standardly that consumers with the same favorite location fully agree on the ranking of all possible locations. To investigate the necessity of this questionable and restrictive assumption, we model heterogeneity in consumers’ distance perceptions by individual edge lengths of a given graph. A profile of location choices is called a “robust equilibrium” if it is a Nash equilibrium in several games which differ only by the consumers’ perceptions of distances. For a finite number of players and any distribution of consumers, we provide a full characterization of all robust equilibria and derive structural conditions for their existence. Furthermore, we discuss whether the classical observations of minimal differentiation and inefficiency are robust phenomena. Thereby, we find strong support for an old conjecture that in equilibrium firms form local clusters.

This paper studies welfare consequences of consumer-side market transparency with endogenous entry of firms. Different from most studies, we consider the unique symmetric entry equilibrium, which is in mixed strategies. We identify two effects of market transparency on welfare: a competition effect and a novel market-structure effect. We show, surprisingly, that for almost all demand functions the negative market-structure effect eventually dominates the positive competition effect as the market becomes increasingly transparent. Consumer-side market transparency can therefore be socially excessive even without collusion. The only exception among commonly used demand functions is the set of constant demand functions.

How is collective defence by players affected when they face a threat from an intelligent attacker rather than a natural threat? This paper analyses this question using a game-theoretic model. Facing an intelligent attacker has an effect if players move first and visibly set their defence strategies, thereby exposing any players who do not defend, and if the attacker is, moreover, not able to commit to a random attack. Depending on the parameters of the game, the presence of an intelligent attacker either increases the probability that players jointly defend (where such joint defence either does or does not constitute a utilitarian optimum), or decreases the probability that players jointly defend (even though joint defence is a utilitarian optimum).

In this paper we introduce the concept of an overall power function that is meant to combine two sources of a party’s power in a parliament. The first source is based on the possibilities for the party to be part of a majority coalition and it is typically modeled using a cooperative simple game. The second source takes into account parties’ asymmetries outside the cooperative game and it is displayed by a vector of exogenously given weights. We adopt a normative point of view and provide an axiomatic characterization of a specific overall power function, in which the weights enter in a proportional fashion.

We discuss a model, in which two agents may distribute finitely many objects among themselves. The conflict is resolved by means of a market procedure. Depending on the specifications, this procedure serves to achieve bargaining solutions such as the discrete Raiffa solution, the Kalai-Smorodinsky solution and the Perles-Maschler solution. The latter is axiomatized using the superadditivity axiom, which in the present context is readily interpreted as resolving a specific source of conflict potential.