A large body of recent research argues that social, or non-market, interactions can explain a wide range of puzzling phenomena from fashion cycles to stock market crashes. This paper attempts to connect the range of these papers with a general model and a broad empirical overview. We establish conditions for existence and uniqueness of equilibria in social interactions models. The existence of multiple equilibria requires sufficient non-linearity in social interactions and only moderate heterogeneity across agents strategic complementarities are neither necesssary nor sufficient for multiple equilibria. We establish conditions for the existence of a social multiplier, which is the ratio of the aggregate outcome-input relationship to the individual outcome-input relationship. Models with multiple equilibria are empirically indistinguishable from models with significant social multipliers. Finally, we show the formal relationship between three known methods of empirically estimating social interactions, and suggests the plusses and minuses of these three approaches.
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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number
8053.
Length: Date of creation: Dec 2000 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:8053
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George J. Mailath & Larry Samuelson & Avner Shaked, 1997.
"Endogenous Interactions,"
CARESS Working Papres
endo-one, University of Pennsylvania Center for Analytic Research and Economics in the Social Sciences.
[Downloadable!]
Edward L. Glaeser & Bruce Sacerdote & Jose A. Scheinkman, 1995.
"Crime and Social Interactions,"
NBER Working Papers
5026, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
[Downloadable!] (restricted)
Ionnides, Yannis M, 1990.
"Trading Uncertainty and Market Form,"
International Economic Review,
Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 31(3), pages 619-38, August.
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