Bargaining in Long-Term Economic Relationships

这个项目有助于我们理解经济主体在讨价还价中的沟通和协调方式。它还开发了一个新的讨价还价模型，可以解释没有罢工的谈判持续时间以及罢工的频率和持续时间。这项研究建立在这位研究人员过去令人印象深刻的贡献基础上。该项目的第一部分是关于代理人如何在完全信息的重复协调博弈中学习如何合作的理论调查。这些游戏允许更清楚地描述在存在多重均衡的情况下理性意味着什么，并提出了学习如何以最纯粹的形式合作的问题。该项目研究代理人的最优策略如何取决于他们是否从一种共同语言开始，用这种共同语言来描述他们的行动和/或他们在游戏中的位置。这项研究有助于解释社会习俗是如何演变的。它澄清了对多重均衡问题的理性回应的概念。第二部分使用动态讨价还价模型来解释罢工的时机和持续时间。这类模型通常将私人信息假定为一个交易者，并依赖于他的类型之间延迟达成协议的成本差异，以实现均衡排序。该项目开发了一种讨价还价的模式，在这种模式下，生产通常在合同谈判期间进行，要求罢工需要工会公开采取行动，后果与不接受公司的最后报价截然不同。罢工增加了双方的延迟成本，还可能带来沉没成本。

This project contributes to our understanding of the way economic agents communicate and coordinate in bargaining. It also develops a new bargaining model which can explain both the duration of negotiations that end without strikes and the frequency and duration of strikes. The research builds on the impressive past contributions of the investigator. The first part of the project is a theoretical investigation of how agents learn how to cooperate in repeated coordination games with complete information. These games allow a clearer characterization of what rationality means in the presence of multiple equilibria, and present the problem of learning how to cooperate in its purest form. The project studies how agents' optimal strategies depend on whether they begin with a common language in which to describe their actions and/or their positions in the game to each other. This research helps explain how social conventions evolve. It clarifies the concept of a rational response to multiple-equilibrium problems. The second part uses dynamic bargaining models to explain the timing and duration of strikes. Such models typically posit private information for one bargainer, and rely on differences in the costs of delaying agreement among his types to sort them in equilibrium. The project develops a bargaining model in which production usually proceeds during contract negotiations, and calling a strike requires an overt action by the union, with consequences vastly different from failing to accept the firm's last offer. Striking increases delay costs for both bargainers, and may also entail sunk costs.