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It is not just escalation: The one dollar game revisited

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  • Migheli, Matteo

Abstract

This paper examines the one-dollar auction game ruling out escalation. The aim of the paper is to understand if players’ expectations about competitors’ moves are strong enough to induce at least one player to bid more than the auctioned euro. Any other bid represents an expected loss for the bidder, so he maximises his own payoff by choosing a bid, which produces a null expected payoff. The empirical results and the analysis based on them support theoretical findings. It is possible that the winner pays more than €1 to get €1 because of his expectations about competitors’ bids and because of his indifference over a certain interval. The results are symptoms of some risk aversion. In an English auction escalation leads to this result, but when escalation is ruled out, expectations and indifference of preferences can lead to the same result.

Suggested Citation

  • Migheli, Matteo, 2012. "It is not just escalation: The one dollar game revisited," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 434-438.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:41:y:2012:i:4:p:434-438
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2011.05.012
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Andrea Morone & Simone Nuzzo & Rocco Caferra, 2019. "The Dollar Auction Game: A Laboratory Comparison Between Individuals and Groups," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 28(1), pages 79-98, February.
    2. Matteo Migheli, 2017. "The winner’s curse in auctions with losses," Mind & Society: Cognitive Studies in Economics and Social Sciences, Springer;Fondazione Rosselli, vol. 16(1), pages 113-126, November.

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    JEL classification:

    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles

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