IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/rwirep/524.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Revenue Maximizing Head Starts in Contests

Author

Listed:
  • Franke, Jörg
  • Leininger, Wolfgang
  • Wasser, Cédric

Abstract

We characterize revenue maximizing head starts for all-pay auctions and lottery contests with many heterogeneous players. We show that under optimal head starts all-pay auctions revenue-dominate lottery contests for any degree of heterogeneity among players. Moreover, all-pay auctions with optimal head starts induce higher revenue than any multiplicatively biased all-pay auction or lottery contest. While head starts are more effective than multiplicative biases in all-pay auctions, they are less effective than multiplicative biases in lottery contests.

Suggested Citation

  • Franke, Jörg & Leininger, Wolfgang & Wasser, Cédric, 2014. "Revenue Maximizing Head Starts in Contests," Ruhr Economic Papers 524, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:rwirep:524
    DOI: 10.4419/86788599
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/105441/1/812896769.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.4419/86788599?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Franke, Jörg & Kanzow, Christian & Leininger, Wolfgang & Schwartz, Alexandra, 2014. "Lottery versus all-pay auction contests: A revenue dominance theorem," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 116-126.
    2. Li, Sanxi & Yu, Jun, 2012. "Contests with endogenous discrimination," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 117(3), pages 834-836.
    3. Dan Kovenock & Michael R. Baye & Casper G. de Vries, 1996. "The all-pay auction with complete information (*)," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 8(2), pages 291-305.
    4. Konrad, Kai A., 2002. "Investment in the absence of property rights; the role of incumbency advantages," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 46(8), pages 1521-1537, September.
    5. Dasgupta, Ani & Nti, Kofi O., 1998. "Designing an optimal contest," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 14(4), pages 587-603, November.
    6. Baye, Michael R & Kovenock, Dan & de Vries, Casper G, 1993. "Rigging the Lobbying Process: An Application of the All-Pay Auction," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(1), pages 289-294, March.
    7. Ella Segev & Aner Sela, 2014. "Sequential all-pay auctions with head starts," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 43(4), pages 893-923, December.
    8. Richard Cornes & Roger Hartley, 2005. "Asymmetric contests with general technologies," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 26(4), pages 923-946, November.
    9. Arye L. Hillman & John G. Riley, 1989. "Politically Contestable Rents And Transfers," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 1(1), pages 17-39, March.
    10. Jörg Franke & Christian Kanzow & Wolfgang Leininger & Alexandra Schwartz, 2013. "Effort maximization in asymmetric contest games with heterogeneous contestants," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 52(2), pages 589-630, March.
    11. Ron Siegel, 2014. "Asymmetric Contests with Head Starts and Nonmonotonic Costs," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(3), pages 59-105, August.
    12. Konrad, Kai A., 2009. "Strategy and Dynamics in Contests," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199549603, Decembrie.
    13. Seel, Christian & Wasser, Cédric, 2014. "On optimal head starts in all-pay auctions," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 124(2), pages 211-214.
    14. Kirkegaard, René, 2012. "Favoritism in asymmetric contests: Head starts and handicaps," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 76(1), pages 226-248.
    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. Häfner, Samuel, 2017. "A tug-of-war team contest," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 372-391.
    2. Samuel Häfner & Georg Nöldeke, 2022. "Sorting in iterated incumbency contests," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 74(4), pages 1103-1140, November.
    3. Subhasish M. Chowdhury & Patricia Esteve‐González & Anwesha Mukherjee, 2023. "Heterogeneity, leveling the playing field, and affirmative action in contests," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 89(3), pages 924-974, January.
    4. MEALEM, Yosef & NITZAN, Shmuel & UI, Takashi & 宇井, 貴志, 2016. "The Advantage of Dual Discrimination in Lottery Contest Games," Discussion paper series HIAS-E-34, Hitotsubashi Institute for Advanced Study, Hitotsubashi University.

    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. Franke, Jörg & Leininger, Wolfgang & Wasser, Cédric, 2018. "Optimal favoritism in all-pay auctions and lottery contests," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 22-37.
    2. repec:zbw:rwirep:0524 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Jörg Franke & Wolfgang Leininger & Cédric Wasser, 2014. "Revenue Maximizing Head Starts in Contests," Ruhr Economic Papers 0524, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universität Dortmund, Universität Duisburg-Essen.
    4. Subhasish M. Chowdhury & Patricia Esteve‐González & Anwesha Mukherjee, 2023. "Heterogeneity, leveling the playing field, and affirmative action in contests," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 89(3), pages 924-974, January.
    5. Clark, Derek J. & Nilssen, Tore, 2018. "Beating the Matthew Effect: Head Starts and Catching Up in a Dynamic All-Pay Auction," Memorandum 2/2018, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    6. Häfner, Samuel, 2017. "A tug-of-war team contest," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 372-391.
    7. Yosef Mealem & Shmuel Nitzan, 2014. "Equity and effectiveness of optimal taxation in contests under an all-pay auction," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 42(2), pages 437-464, February.
    8. Franke, Jörg & Kanzow, Christian & Leininger, Wolfgang & Schwartz, Alexandra, 2014. "Lottery versus all-pay auction contests: A revenue dominance theorem," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 116-126.
    9. Dahm, Matthias & Esteve-González, Patricia, 2018. "Affirmative action through extra prizes," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 123-142.
    10. Sérgio O. Parreiras & Anna Rubinchik, 2020. "Ex ante heterogeneity in all-pay many-player auctions with Pareto distribution of costs," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 70(3), pages 765-783, October.
    11. Ewerhart, Christian, 2017. "Contests with small noise and the robustness of the all-pay auction," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 195-211.
    12. Zhu, Feng, 2021. "On optimal favoritism in all-pay contests," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    13. Kräkel, Matthias & Szech, Nora & von Bieberstein, Frauke, 2014. "Externalities in recruiting," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 107(PA), pages 123-135.
    14. Lu, Jingfeng & Wang, Zhewei & Zhou, Lixue, 2022. "Optimal favoritism in contests with identity-contingent prizes," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 196(C), pages 40-50.
    15. Gil Epstein & Yosef Mealem, 2015. "Politicians, governed versus non-governed interest groups and rent dissipation," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 79(1), pages 133-149, July.
    16. Dahm, Matthias, 2018. "Semi-targeted all-pay auctions: A partial exclusion principle," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 256-282.
    17. Ella Segev & Aner Sela, 2014. "Sequential all-pay auctions with head starts," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 43(4), pages 893-923, December.
    18. Clark, Derek J. & Nilssen, Tore, 2018. "Keep on fighting: The dynamics of head starts in all-pay auctions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 258-272.
    19. Fu, Qiang & Wu, Zenan, 2020. "On the optimal design of biased contests," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 15(4), November.
    20. Jia, Hao & Skaperdas, Stergios & Vaidya, Samarth, 2013. "Contest functions: Theoretical foundations and issues in estimation," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 211-222.
    21. J. Atsu Amegashie, 2012. "A Nested Contest: Tullock Meets the All-pay Auction," CESifo Working Paper Series 3976, CESifo.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    all-pay auction; lottery contest; head start; revenue dominance;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:zbw:rwirep:524. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/rwiesde.html .

    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.