Imitation and the evolution of Walrasian behavior: Theoretically fragile but behaviorally robust

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Apesteguia, Jose; Huck, Steffen; Oechssler, Joerg; Weidenholzer, Simon
• 署名单位: Ruprecht Karls University Heidelberg; Pompeu Fabra University; University of London; University College London; University of London; University College London; University of Vienna
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC THEORY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0022-0531
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jet.2010.02.014
• 发表日期: 2010
• 页码: 1603-1617
• 关键词: Evolutionary game theory; stochastic stability; imitation; Cournot markets; INFORMATION; experiments; simulations

摘要

A well-known result by Vega-Redondo implies that in symmetric Cournot oligopoly, imitation leads to the Walrasian outcome where price equals marginal cost. In this paper we show that this result is not robust to the slightest asymmetry in fixed costs. Instead of obtaining the Walrasian outcome as unique prediction, every outcome where agents choose identical actions will be played some fraction of the time in the long run. We then conduct experiments to check this fragility. We obtain that, contrary to the theoretical prediction, the Walrasian outcome is still a good predictor of behavior. (C) 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.