IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/phsmap/v370y2006i1p81-85.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Profit maximization, industry structure, and competition: A critique of neoclassical theory

Author

Listed:
  • Keen, Steve
  • Standish, Russell

Abstract

Neoclassical economics has two theories of competition between profit-maximizing firms—Marshallian and Cournot–Nash—that start from different premises about the degree of strategic interaction between firms, yet reach the same result, that market price falls as the number of firms in an industry increases. The Marshallian argument is strictly false. We integrate the different premises, and establish that the optimal level of strategic interaction between competing firms is zero. Simulations support our analysis and reveal intriguing emergent behaviors.

Suggested Citation

  • Keen, Steve & Standish, Russell, 2006. "Profit maximization, industry structure, and competition: A critique of neoclassical theory," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 370(1), pages 81-85.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:phsmap:v:370:y:2006:i:1:p:81-85
    DOI: 10.1016/j.physa.2006.04.032
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378437106004456
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only. Journal offers the option of making the article available online on Science direct for a fee of $3,000
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.physa.2006.04.032?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fernando Vega-Redondo, 1997. "The Evolution of Walrasian Behavior," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(2), pages 375-384, March.
    2. Keen, Steve, 2004. "Deregulator: Judgment Day for microeconomics," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 109-125, September.
    3. G. J. Stigler, 1972. "Perfect Competition, Historically Contemplated," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Charles K. Rowley (ed.), Readings in Industrial Economics, chapter 7, pages 105-130, Palgrave Macmillan.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Fix, Blair, 2020. "Economic Development and the Death of the Free Market," Working Papers on Capital as Power 2020/01, Capital As Power - Toward a New Cosmology of Capitalism.
    2. Anglin, Paul, 2008. "On the proper behavior of atoms: A comment on a critique," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 387(1), pages 277-280.
    3. Fix, Blair, 2020. "Economic Development and the Death of the Free Market," SocArXiv g86am, Center for Open Science.
    4. Promit Kanti Chaudhuri, 2021. "Strategic inattention and divisionalization in duopoly," Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Mumbai Working Papers 2021-020, Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Mumbai, India.
    5. Russell K. Standish & Stephen L. Keen, 2015. "Rationality in the Theory of the Firm," World Economic Review, World Economics Association, vol. 2015(5), pages 101-101, July.
    6. Blair Fix, 2022. "Economic development and the death of the free market," Evolutionary and Institutional Economics Review, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 1-46, April.
    7. Dariusz Klimek & Elżbieta Jędrych, 2020. "A Model for the Sustainable Management of Enterprise Capital," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(1), pages 1-13, December.
    8. Bell, William Paul, 2009. "Adaptive interactive expectations: dynamically modelling profit expectations," MPRA Paper 38260, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 09 Feb 2010.
    9. Barreira da Silva Rocha, André, 2013. "Evolutionary dynamics of nationalism and migration," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 392(15), pages 3183-3197.
    10. Gerasimos T. Soldatos, 2021. "A model of market competition as a prize contest or a model of strife for market domination," SN Business & Economics, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 1-9, January.
    11. Cellini, Roberto & Lambertini, Luca & Ottaviano, Gianmarco I.P., 2020. "Strategic inattention, delegation and endogenous market structure," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).
    12. David Rosnick, 2015. "Toward an Understanding of Keen and Standish's Theory of the Firm: A Comment," World Economic Review, World Economics Association, vol. 2015(5), pages 107-107, July.
    13. Segismundo S. Izquierdo & Luis R. Izquierdo, 2015. "The “Win-Continue, Lose-Reverse” Rule In Oligopolies: Robustness Of Collusive Outcomes," Advances in Complex Systems (ACS), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 18(05n06), pages 1-23, August.
    14. Elżbieta Jędrych & Dariusz Klimek & Agnieszka Rzepka, 2021. "Principles of Sustainable Management of Energy Companies: The Case of Poland," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(8), pages 1-18, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Russell K. Standish & Steve Keen, 2004. "Emergent Effective Collusion in an Economy of Perfectly Rational Competitors," Papers nlin/0411006, arXiv.org.
    2. Güth, W., 1997. "Boundedly Rational Decision Emergence -A General Perspective and Some Selective Illustrations-," SFB 373 Discussion Papers 1997,29, Humboldt University of Berlin, Interdisciplinary Research Project 373: Quantification and Simulation of Economic Processes.
    3. Jacob K. Goeree & Leeat Yariv, 2015. "Conformity in the lab," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 15-28, July.
    4. Jael, Paul, 2019. "Does Marginal Productivity Mean Anything in Real Economic Life ?," MPRA Paper 97968, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Jan 2020.
    5. Burkhard C. Schipper, 2004. "Submodularity and the evolution of Walrasian behavior," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 32(4), pages 471-477, August.
    6. Agnar Sandmo, 2003. "Environmental Taxation and Revenue for Development," WIDER Working Paper Series DP2003-86, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    7. Alos-Ferrer, Carlos & Ania, Ana B., 2001. "Local equilibria in economic games," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 165-173, February.
    8. Tanaka, Yasuhito, 2019. "Analysis of dynamic symmetric three-players zero-sum game with a leader and two followers without differentiability of payoff functions," MPRA Paper 91919, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Huck, Steffen & Normann, Hans-Theo & Oechssler, Jorg, 2000. "Does information about competitors' actions increase or decrease competition in experimental oligopoly markets?," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 39-57, January.
    10. Bigoni, Maria & Fort, Margherita, 2013. "Information and learning in oligopoly: An experiment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 192-214.
    11. Roland Pongou & Roberto Serrano, 2009. "A dynamic theory of fidelity networks with an application to the spread of HIV/AIDS," Working Papers 2009-03, Instituto Madrileño de Estudios Avanzados (IMDEA) Ciencias Sociales.
    12. Kosuke Hirose & Toshihiro Matsumura, 2016. "Payoff interdependence and the multi-store paradox," Asia-Pacific Journal of Accounting & Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(3), pages 256-267, July.
    13. Klaus Abbink & Ronald Bosman & Ronald Heijmans & Frans van Winden, 2017. "Disruptions in Large-Value Payment Systems: An Experimental Approach," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 13(4), pages 63-95, December.
    14. Octavian-Dragomir Jora & Gheorghe Hurduzeu & Mihaela Iacob & Georgiana-Camelia Cre?an, 2017. "“Dialectical Contradictions” in the Neoclassical Theory and Policy Regarding Market Competition: The Consumer and His Continuos Burden of Crisis," The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania, vol. 19(45), pages 544-544, May.
    15. Andreas Nicklisch, 2011. "Learning strategic environments: an experimental study of strategy formation and transfer," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 71(4), pages 539-558, October.
    16. Geys, Benny & Konrad, Kai A., . "Federalism and optimal allocation across levels of governance," Chapters in Economics,, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    17. Klaus Abbink & Jordi Brandts, 2002. "24," UFAE and IAE Working Papers 523.02, Unitat de Fonaments de l'Anàlisi Econòmica (UAB) and Institut d'Anàlisi Econòmica (CSIC).
      • Jordi Brandts & Klaus Abbink, 2004. "24," Levine's Bibliography 122247000000000073, UCLA Department of Economics.
    18. Butler, Leslie J. & Burnett, Todd, 1992. "Cooperatives As A Source Of Countervailing Market Power In The California Lamb Market," Research Reports 140053, University of California, Davis, Center for Cooperatives.
    19. Backhaus, Teresa & Huck, Steffen & Leutgeb, Johannes & Oprea, Ryan, 2023. "Learning through period and physical time," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 21-29.
    20. repec:awi:wpaper:0461 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Fallucchi, Francesco & Renner, Elke & Sefton, Martin, 2013. "Information feedback and contest structure in rent-seeking games," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 223-240.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:phsmap:v:370:y:2006:i:1:p:81-85. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/physica-a-statistical-mechpplications/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.