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Insisting on a Non-Negative Price: Oligopoly, Uncertainty, Welfare, and Multiple Equilibria

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Author Info
Johan Lagerlof (WZB Berlin)

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Abstract

I study Cournot competition under incomplete information about demand while assuming that market price must be non-negative for all demand realizations. Although this assumption is very natural, it has only rarely been made in the earlier literature. Yet it has important economic consequences: (1) multiple (symmetric, pure strategy) equilibria can exist, despite the fact that demand and cost are linear; and (2) expected total surplus can be larger when the firms do not know demand than when they do, a result which has important implications for the social desirability of information sharing. The arguments of the paper are relevant also for price competition and for uncertainty about, e.g., cost or the number of firms, and these issues are discussed.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by EconWPA in its series Microeconomics with number 0304006.

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Length: 26 pages
Date of creation: 24 Apr 2003
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwpmi:0304006

Note: Type of Document - ; pages: 26; figures: included
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Web page: http://129.3.20.41

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Related research
Keywords: Non-negativity constraint; Multiple equilibria; Value of information; Information sharing; Trade associations; Antitrust policy;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
D42 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure and Pricing - - - Monopoly
D43 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure and Pricing - - - Oligopoly and Other Forms of Market Imperfection
D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General
L12 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Monopoly; Monopolization Strategies
L13 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Oligopoly and Other Imperfect Markets
L40 - Industrial Organization - - Antitrust Issues and Policies - - - General

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Xavier Vives, 2001. "Oligopoly Pricing: Old Ideas and New Tools," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 026272040x, January.
  2. Li, Lode., 1985. "Cournot Oligopoly with Information Sharing," Working Papers 561, California Institute of Technology, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences. [Downloadable!]
  3. Malueg, David A & Tsutsui, Shunichi O, 1998. "Oligopoly Information Exchange When Non-negative Price and Output Constraints May Bind," Australian Economic Papers, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 37(4), pages 363-71, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Basar, Tamer & Ho, Yu-Chi, 1974. "Informational properties of the Nash solutions of two stochastic nonzero-sum games," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 7(4), pages 370-387, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Rabah Amir, 2000. "On the Effects of Entry in Cournot Markets," Econometric Society World Congress 2000 Contributed Papers 1475, Econometric Society. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  6. Novshek, William, 1985. "On the Existence of Cournot Equilibrium," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 52(1), pages 85-98, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  7. Vives, Xavier, 1984. "Duopoly information equilibrium: Cournot and bertrand," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 71-94, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Gal-Or, Esther, 1986. "Information Transmission-Cournot and Bertrand Equilibria," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 53(1), pages 85-92, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Lode Li, 1985. "Cournot Oligopoly with Information Sharing," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 16(4), pages 521-536, Winter. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. Gal-Or, Esther, 1985. "Information Sharing in Oligopoly," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 53(2), pages 329-43, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  11. Amir, Rabah, 1996. "Cournot Oligopoly and the Theory of Supermodular Games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 132-148, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  12. Raith, Michael, 1996. "A General Model of Information Sharing in Oligopoly," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 260-288, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  13. Kai-Uwe Kühn, 2001. "Fighting collusion by regulating communication between firms," Economic Policy, CEPR, CES, MSH, vol. 16(32), pages 167-204, 04. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. William Novshek & Hugo Sonnenschein, 1982. "Fulfilled Expectations Cournot Duopoly with Information Acquisition and Release," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 13(1), pages 214-218, Spring. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. Shapiro, Carl, 1986. "Exchange of Cost Information in Oligopoly," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 53(3), pages 433-46, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  16. Xavier Vives, 1990. "Trade Association Disclosure Rules, Incentives to Share Information, and Welfare," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 21(3), pages 409-430, Autumn. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Weitzman, Martin L, 1974. "Prices vs. Quantities," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(4), pages 477-91, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  18. Richard N. Clarke, 1983. "Collusion and the Incentives for Information Sharing," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 14(2), pages 383-394, Autumn. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Johan Lagerlöf, 2006. "Equilibrium Uniqueness in a Cournot Model with Demand Uncertainty," Topics in Theoretical Economics, Berkeley Electronic Press, vol. 6(1), pages 1333-1333. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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