innovation and imitation in a duopoly in a duopoly where one firm has the idea for a non patentable innovation the expected profits from the innovation will not be a monotonic function of the cost of innovating furthermore a costly innovation may be undertaken where an inexpensive one would not have been all other things being equal

technology acquisition with technological progress effects of expectations rivalry and uncertainty abstract we study the effect of expectations regarding technological progress on a firm s technology adoption decision in a duopoly new generation technologies become available one in each period with successive generations representing better and better performance a game theoretic framework is used involving two identical firms competing in the same market over two periods it is shown that expectations retard adoption of the first period technology it is also shown that an asymmetric equilibrium results in higher social welfare and that more investment does not necessarily mean higher levels of welfare uncertainty is shown to have either no effect or a negative effect on the adoption of the current technology when nash equilibrium holds however when subgame perfect equilibrium holds uncertainty has a more complicated effect and numerical examples show that it may even encourage the adoption of the current technology relative to the deterministic equilibrium

on minimal ascending auctions with payment discounts the literature on ascending combinatorial auctions yields conflicting insights regarding the possibility to implement the vickrey payoffs for general valuations we introduce the class of minimal ascending auctions a class which allows one to disconnect the final payments from the final bids but which prohibits the raising of the price vector of a provisionally winning bidder we first establish the impossibility of implementing the vickrey payoffs for general valuations second we propose a minimal ascending auction that yields a bidder optimal competitive equilibrium thanks to payment discounts

technological expectations and adoption of improved technology abstract attention is focused upon the adoption demand rather than the creation supply of new technology which improves from time to time based on the expected flow of technological progress over which the firm demander has no control it must decide either to adopt the current best available technology or to postpone adoption the distinguishing features of the model are that more than one technological innovation is anticipated and expectations about the likelihood of such innovations are revised as time passes since the last innovation our analysis shows that the firm will adopt the current best practice if its technological lag exceeds a certain threshold moreover as time passes without new technological advances it may become profitable to purchase a technology that has been available even though it was not profitable to do so in the past

the war of attrition in continuous time with complete information this paper provides a complete characterization of the nash equilibrium outcomes for the war of attrition when time is continuous and information is complete it allows for asymmetric payoffs and an arbitrary time horizon in addition to certain asymme tric pure strategy equilibria that always exist the authors establi sh the conditions under which there is also a continuum of mixed strategy equilibria these are most likely to exist when either the horizon is infinite or the game is symmetric copyright 1988 by economics department of the university of pennsylvania and the osaka university institute of social and economic research association

an empirical evaluation of the macroeconomic effects of tarrifs abstract the macroeconomic effects of unilateral tariff changes are reviewed in a variety of theoretical models it is shown that there is no theoretical presumption about the effects of tariffs on output or the trade balance five different data sets are found to be consistent with the hypothesis that tariff changs have no significant effects on the real exchange rate the real trade balance and real output both foreign and domestic tariff rates do appear to have a negative effect on the gross volume of international trade jel f13 f40

potential competition in preemption games we consider a preemption game with two potential competitors who come into play at some random secret times the presence of a competitor is revealed to a player only when the former moves which terminates the game we show that all perfect bayesian equilibria give rise to the same distribution of players moving times moreover there exists a unique perfect bayesian equilibrium in which each player s behavior from any time on is independent of the date at which she came into play we flnd that competitive pressure is nonmonotonic over time and that private information tends to alleviate rent dissipation our results have a natural interpretation in terms of eroding reputations

the impact of trade liberalisation on exports imports and the balance of payments of developing countries this paper uses panel data and times series cross section analysis to estimate the effect of trade liberalisation on export growth import growth the balance of trade and the balance of payments for a sample of 22 developing countries that have adopted trade liberalisation policies since the mid 1970s we find that liberalisation stimulated export growth but raised import growth by more leading to a worsening of the balance of trade and payments to the extent that this has constrained the growth of output and living standards the findings have important implications for the sequencing and degree of liberalisation

reputation and imperfect information abstract a common observation in the informal literature of economics and elsewhere is that is multistage games players may seek early in the game to acquire a reputation for being tough or benevolent or something else but this phenomenon is not observed in some formal game theoretic analyses of finite games such as selten s finitely repeated chain store game or in the finitely repeated prisoners dilemma we reexamine selten s model adding to it a small amount of imperfect or incomplete information about players payoffs and we find that this addition is sufficient to give rise to the reputation effect that one intuitively expects

a new approach to decomposition of economic time series into permanent and transitory components with particular attention to measurement of the business cycle abstract this paper introduces a general procedure for decomposition of non stationary time series into a permanent and transitory component allowing both components to be stochastic the permanent component is shown to be a random walk with drift and the transitory or cyclical component is a stationary process with mean zero the decomposition methodology which depends only on past data and therefore is computable in real time is applied to the problem of measuring and dating business cycles in the portwar u s economy we find that measured expansions and contractions are of roughly equivalent duration and that our dating of cyclical episodes tends to lead the traditional nber dating and to a lesser extent the growth cycle chronology of zarnowitz and boschan 1977

trade taxes and the current account abstract we show that under some conditions a temporary import tariff improves the current account whereas a temporary export tax deteriorates it permanent import tariffs and export taxes have an identical although ambiguous effect on the current account

tariff liberalisation and the growth of world trade a comparative historical analysis of the multilateral trading system the aim of this study is to assess the relationship between tariff barriers and world trade growth from a comparative and historical perspective and at the same time derive some useful indications for the evaluation of the effectiveness of the current multilateral trading system in promoting world trade the distinguishing feature of this work is the complex reconstruction of the historical series for the period 1870 2000 on the tariffs and trade of 23 countries thus constituting a good proxy of world trade for the period considered accounting for over 60 per cent the study of the relationship between tariff liberalization and trade growth was made through an empirical analysis using panel data and time series the empirical results whilst confirming the existence of a long term relationship at world level between tariff reductions and trade growth demonstrate how this substantial and significant relationship in the period prior to world war ii gradually lost importance and significance from 1950 onwards this result does not controvert the role that the gatt wto system has played in trade liberalization but would confirm the arguments of those sustaining the importance of the presence of a formalized multilateral trading system not so much in tariff liberalization but in building a virtuous process of international coordination of trade policies and to ensure a fairer and fuller participation in world trade

strategic timing of adoption of new technologies under uncertainty abstract in this paper we introduce experience effects into a duopoly game of timing of adoption of new technologies which exhibit exogenous technological progress departing from the existing literature with this model we obtain continuous and downward sloping reaction functions we find that a higher level of uncertainty increases the extent of dispersion between the equilibrium timings of adoption furthermore we find that the equilibrium timings are even more dispersed when the leader takes the follower s reaction into account when firm roles are made endogenous we find that if there is an incentive to lead follow the equilibrium timings are more less dispersed finally we show that it is possible for collusive adoption to improve welfare

tariffs employment and the current account real wage resistance and the macroeconomics of protectionism using a standard complete specialization model of a small open economy within a rigorous intertemporal optimization framework and with contract based wage rigidity we show that permanent tariffs lead to a current account deterioration and a fall in employment contradicting most of the literature on macroeconomic effects of import tariffs the crucial factor in this complete reversal of standard results is the impact of tariffs on domestic real product wages via wage indexation temporary tariffs will have less of a negative impact on the ca or potentially even a positive impact because they increase the consumption rate of interest the terms at which future consumption can be traded for current consumption and so increase private savings extensions towards incorporating a more general production structure investment and the use of tariff revenues to provide wage subsidies are presented this abstract was borrowed from another version of this item

adoption and diffusion of an innovation of uncertain profitability the argument has frequently been made that the pattern of diffusion associated with most new innovations will typically have certain characteristics a diffusion curve for an innovation is usually defined as the proportion of its potential users who have already adopted as a function of time measured from the first adoption many empirical studies by both economists and other social scientists have shown that diffusion curves nearly always have two distinct characteristics i they are s shaped the proportion adopted is an increasing function of time which is initially convex but eventually becomes concave and ii they tend to be right hand skewed the inflection point occurs at a time corresponding to a proportion adopted which is less than one half so that the function is concave over the greatest amount of time in fact this skewing is occasionally severe enough to make the diffusion curve appear concave everywhere the focus of most empirical studies of innovation diffusion has centered on identification of either the major determinants of the speed of diffusion or the characteristics of firms which determine how long they delay adoption the seminal contributions are griliches 6 study of hybrid corn and mansfield s 121 study of 12 industrial innovations these studies and most of the similar ones following conclude that diffusion is faster for innovations with higher profitability and that large firms tend to be the earliest adopters some studies e g mansfield 121 herregat 71 have attempted to ascertain

strategic timing of adoption of new technologies under uncertainty a note abstract this note clarifies the circumstances under which ex ante identical firms will choose different dates for the adoption of new technology in particular conditions under which diffusion will arise in both open loop and closed loop games are identified furthermore it is shown that the rents of nonidentical firms are not equalized even if pre emptive adoption is possible finally an example is given in which the reduction of the uncertainty associated with the implementation of new technology leads to a postponement of the adoption by the late adopter

analysis and algorithm for the optimal investment times of new manufacturing technologies in a duopoly abstract on the basis of a dynamic and non cooperative game theoretic model the optimal timings of investments in new manufacturing technologies nmt is analysed under duopolistic competition non identical incumbents with time proportional demand always wait for some delay to invest in nmt the existence of silent timing equilibrium is addressed subsequently we show that cost reducing nmt diffuse over time within a duopoly the investments in strategic nmt however may be distributed through time or in a swarm economic interpretations of initial options and the comparative statics presented in this paper help decision makers develop strategies and make decisions under the situation they face finally a computational algorithm of optimal timings could verify this analysis and facilitate the real applications of game theoretic models

preemptive adoptions of an emerging technology many oligopolies exhibit continuing technological change and lumpy costs of adopting new technologies if firms choose adoption dates in a game of timing and if the downstream market structure is a bertrand duopoly the equilibrium adoption pattern displays rent dissipating increasing dominance i e all adoptions are by the same firm and the discounted value of profits is zero these results need not hold for other market structures including cournot duopoly copyright 1994 by blackwell publishing ltd

reputations in the adoption of a new technology abstract this paper studies the effects of uncertainty on the timing of adoption of a new technology in a duopoly firms are uncertain of the innovative capabilities of their rivals and about the profitability of adoption these features lead to a richer and in some respects more plausible theory of adoption in which rents from delayed adoption are always realized and returns are not equalized across adoption times

tariffs and exchange rate dynamics redux abstract this paper builds a two country intertemporal macroeconomic model similar to one developed recently by obstfeld and rogoff imperfectly competitive producer consumers maximize an intertemporal utility function with consumption real money balances and output as arguments we use the framework to examine both the short run and steady state effects of the imposition of a tariff in one of the countries this results in a fall in the tariff imposer s output in both the steady state and in the short run a small tariff may make a country worse off contrary to the usual result under perfect competition spillover effects are also considered

innovation in a generalized timing game we examine innovation as a market entry timing game with complete information and observable actions we characterize all pure strategy subgame perfect equilibria for the two player symmetric model allowing both the leader s and the follower s payoff functions to be multi peaked non monotonic and discontinuous we provide sufficient conditions for when the equilibria can be pareto ranked and when the equilibrium is unique economic applications discussed include process and product innovation and the timing of the sale of an asset

the march of an economic idea protectionism isn t counter cyclic anymore conventional wisdom holds that protectionism is counter cyclic tariffs quotas and the like grow during recessions while that may have been a valid description of the data before the first world war it is now inaccurate since the second world war protectionism has not been counter cyclic tariffs and non tariff barriers simply do not rise systematically during downturns i document this new stylised fact with a panel of data covering over 180 countries and 40 years using over a dozen measures of protectionism and six of business cycles i test and reject a number of potential reasons why protectionism is no longer counter cyclic a diagnosis of exclusion leads me to believe that modern economics may well be responsible for the decline in protectionism s cyclic behaviour economists are more united in their disdain for protectionism than virtually any other concept this in turn leaves one optimistic that the level of protectionism will continue to decline along with its cyclicality andrew k rose

preemptive patenting and the persistence of monopoly this article takes a different tack and inquires whether institutions such as the patent system create opportunities for firms with monopoly power to maintain their monopoly power the results apply to other situations such as brand identification spatial location and capacity expansion which share the characteristic that early or preemptive actions may lower the returns to potential competitors

why has trade grown faster than income trade of the oecd countries has grown faster than income during the postwar period this paper tests a number of different hypotheses for the observed growth in the trade income ratio for small open economies increases in real output and international reserves as well as declines in tariff rates are associated with growth in the ratio there are important differences in the behavior of the trade ratio across time and country size

information acquisition and the adoption of new technology the profitability of a new technology is rarely known with certainty at its announcement date consequently prior to making an adoption decision it behooves the firm considering the adoption of this innovation to reduce the level of uncertainty associated with its profitability the firm accomplishes this by sequentially gathering information updating its prior estimate of profitability in a bayesian manner quantifying the uncertainty regarding the innovation permits application of dynamic programming techniques criteria are derived which tell the firm when to stop collecting information and make the adoption decision it will be shown that it is optimal for the firm to continue to collect information until its estimate of profitability crosses one of two thresholds upon crossing the upper threshold the firm adopts the technology whereas the firm rejects the technology if the lower threshold is crossed the model predicts that even the manager who behaves optimally will occasionally adopt unprofitable technologies and reject profitable ones

second mover advantages in the strategic adoption of new technology under uncertainty abstract this paper introduces technological uncertainty into a timing game of new technology adoption it is shown that the timing neither necessarily involves first mover advantages in precommitment equilibria reinganum review of economic studies xlviii 1981 395 405 nor rent equalization due to the threat of preemption fudenberg and tirole review of economic studies lii 1985 383 401 rather there may be second mover advantages because of informational spillovers furthermore the model predicts that the equilibrium payoffs will typically be discontinuous and non monotonic in the probability that the new technology is profitable a welfare analysis reveals several market failures and suggests that policy intervention should adequately depend on the nature of uncertainty and the rate of technological progress

on the diffusion of new technology a game theoretic approach this paper is an attempt at a rigorous albeit not exceedingly general analysis of the diffusion of new technology in particular consider an industry composed of two firms each using the current best practice technology the firms are assumed to be operating at nash equilibrium output levels generating a market price given demand and profit allocations when a cost reducing innovation is announced each firm must determine when if ever to adopt it based in part upon the discounted cost of implementing the new technology and in part upon the behavior of the rival firm if either firm adopts before the other it can expect to make substantial profits at the expense of the other firm on the other hand the discounted sum of purchase price and adjustment costs may decline with the lengthening of the adjustment period as various quasi fixed factors become more easily variable therefore although waiting costs the firm more in terms of foregone profits it may save money on the cost of purchasing the new technology thus the firm must weigh the costs and benefits of delaying adoption as well as take account of its rival s strategic behavior

multi item auctions a collection of items is to be distributed among several bidders and each bidder is to receive at most one item assuming that the bidders place some monetary value on each of the items it has been shown that there is a unique vector of equilibrium prices that is optimal in a suitable sense for the bidders in this paper we describe two dynamic auction mechanisms one achieves this equilibrium and the other approximates it to any desired degree of accuracy

drivers of export demand a focus on the giips countries this study investigates the drivers of export demand in the peripheral economies of the euro area namely greece ireland italy portugal and spain giips for the period between 1980 and 2012 recently several authors have pointed out that changes in trade export shares are not associated with major terms of trade disturbances rather they are the result of other underlying factors commonly defined as non price competitiveness starting from this premise the study extends the traditional imperfect substitute trade model to include a measure of non price competitiveness real capital stock the latter is a measure of a country s total resource base and captures the presence of product differentiation and product innovation the results show a significant link between export demand and cumulative investments in the short term giips exports are dominated by the movements of worldwide real income while changes in price and non competitiveness take longer to affect export performance in the long run all three variables play a significant role in pushing exports

preemption and rent equalization in the adoption of new technology we study the adoption of a new technology to illustrate the effects of preemption in games of timing we show that the threat of preemption equalizes rents in a duopoly but that this result does not extend to the general oligopoly game if the gain to preemption is sufficiently small then the optimal symmetric outcome which involves late adoption is an equilibrium this contrasts with reinganum s result that in precommitment equilibria there must be diffusion we develop a new and richer formalism for modeling games of timing which permits a continuoustime representation of the limit of discrete time mixed strategy equilibria

timing of technology adoption and product market competition abstract this paper examines how product market competition affects firms timing of adopting a new technology as well as whether the market provides sufficient adoption incentives it demonstrates that adoption dates differ not only among symmetric firms but also among markets with different market features more specifically technology adoption can occur earlier in a market with cournot competition than in a market with bertrand competition it can also occur earlier in a market in which goods are not too close substitutes therefore this paper shows that competition toughness does not always reinforce adoption incentives when goods are sufficiently differentiated adoption occurs later than is socially optimal

strategic investment in technological innovations abstract the aim of this paper is to determine the optimal timing of technology investment of a single firm in a duopoly framework as time passes different technologies are invented which after sometime become available for the firm to adopt the question here is not only when a firm should invest but also which technology should be adopted for different scenarios the optimal technology investment decision is determined outcomes range from pre emption equilibria to equilibria with second mover advantages

an efficient multi unit ascending auction we provide an ascending auction that yields an e cient outcome when there are many identical units for sale and bidders have interdependent values and downward sloping demand our ascending auction both extends and generalizes ausubel s 1997 and yields the same outcome as perry and reny s 2000 generalization of vickrey s 1961 sealed bid auction there are two key components to our auction bidders are permitted both to

exchange rate pass through and the effects of tariffs on economic performance and welfare abstract we develop a stochastic two country general equilibrium model where prices are determined under conditions of monopolistic competition to examine the macroeconomic and welfare effects of tariffs on the world economy under alternative nominal rigidities producer currency pricing pcp and local currency pricing lcp where the exchange rate pass through is absent we find that the significance of export pricing for the effects of tariffs depends critically upon whether tariffs are anticipated or unanticipated in the former case both pcp and lcp yield the same outcome as do perfectly flexible prices although the mechanism whereby this is achieved is different in the latter case the effects of unanticipated permanent tariffs are highly sensitive to the pricing scheme adopted by exporters leading to a wide range of conflicting outcomes involving tradeoffs among key parameters