Doctoral Dissertation Research in Economics: Knowledge of Rivals' Types and Its Effect on Auctions

经济学博士论文研究：竞争对手类型的知识及其对拍卖的影响

• 批准号: 0137162
• 负责人: Yeon-Koo Che
• 金额: $ 0.48万
• 依托单位: University of Wisconsin-Madison
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2002
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2002-03-15 至 2005-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0137162&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Economics; Knowledge

The purpose of the doctoral dissertation project is to experimentally test the effect of bidders' information of their rivals' types in standard auctions. Auctions are used widely for trading goods and services, ranging from artwork and agricultural products to government assets such as PCS spectrum rights, timber and mineral harvesting rights. While the existing studies on auctions have made great strides, our understanding remains far from complete. In particular, how bidders' knowledge of their rivals affects their bidding behavior and the performance of various auctions is not well understood. The existing work assumes that bidders have either no information or full information about their rivals. In practice, however, bidders' knowledge about their rivals tends to be asymmetric. For instance, in a procurement auction contested by domestic firms and foreign firms, domestic firms are likely to be better informed about the technical capabilities of their domestic rivals than those of their foreign rivals. The current project will contribute to our understanding of the impact bidders' information has on their behavior and on the performance of standard auctions.Bidders' asymmetric knowledge about their rivals matters and it may affect both the bidders' behavior and the performance of alternative auction forms. The first chapter of my dissertation, written jointly with Yeon-Koo Che, has also established a number of hypotheses regarding how the equilibrium bidding behavior and the revenue performance of a given auction will change as bidders learn more about their rivals' types. Testing our hypotheses requires controlling the information flow of the bidders, which would be virtually impossible if one relied on the traditional empirical method employing secondary data. A lab experiment is ideal since the experiment designer can control the information flow precisely the way it is modelled in the theory. We plan to conduct 6 sessions of lab experiments, each of which will invite 32 subjects to participate in a series of auction games. The research will feature some innovative techniques to improve the empirical identification of the subjects' bidding behavior. While the main purpose of the experiment will be to test the specific hypotheses of the theory chapter, it will in the process contribute to the testing of the underlying Nash hypothesis, by subjecting it to more comparative static restrictions. Further, the test is expected to reveal the role bidders' risk aversion plays in auction experiments.

本博士论文项目的目的是通过实验检验竞标者竞争对手类型信息对标准拍卖的影响。拍卖广泛用于商品和服务交易，范围从艺术品和农产品到政府资产，如PCS频谱权、木材和矿产采伐权。虽然现有的关于拍卖的研究已经取得了很大的进步，但我们的理解还远远不够完整。特别是，竞标者对竞争对手的了解如何影响他们的竞标行为和各种拍卖的表现，还没有得到很好的理解。现有的研究假设竞标者要么不了解竞争对手，要么完全了解竞争对手。然而，在实践中，竞标者对竞争对手的了解往往是不对称的。例如，在国内公司和外国公司竞争的采购拍卖中，国内公司可能比其外国竞争对手更了解其国内竞争对手的技术能力。目前的项目将有助于我们了解竞标者的信息对他们的行为和标准拍卖的表现的影响。竞标者对其竞争对手的不对称知识很重要，这可能会影响竞标者的行为和其他拍卖形式的表现。我的论文的第一章，与Yeon-Koo Che合著，也建立了一些假设，关于均衡竞标行为和给定拍卖的收入表现将如何随着竞标者更多地了解竞争对手的类型而变化。检验我们的假设需要控制竞标者的信息流，如果依靠使用二手数据的传统经验方法，这实际上是不可能的。实验室实验是理想的，因为实验设计者可以精确地按照理论模型的方式控制信息流。我们计划进行6次实验，每次实验将邀请32名受试者参与一系列的拍卖游戏。本研究将采用一些创新的技术来改进对被试投标行为的实证识别。虽然实验的主要目的是测试理论章节的具体假设，但在此过程中，它将通过使其受到更多相对静态限制，从而有助于测试潜在的纳什假设。此外，该测试有望揭示竞标者的风险厌恶在拍卖实验中所起的作用。