IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/1412.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Supergame-Theoretic Model of Business Cycles and Price Wars During Booms

Author

Listed:
  • Julio J. Rotemberg
  • Garth Saloner

Abstract

This paper studies implicitly colluding oligopolists facing fluctuating demand. The credible threat of future punishments provides the discipline that facilitates collusion. However, we find that the temptation to unilaterally deflate from the collusive outcome is often greater when demand is high. To moderate this temptation,the optimizing oligopoly reduces its profitability at such times,resulting in lower prices. If the oligopolists' output is an input to other sectors, their output may increase too. This explains the co-movements of outputs which characterize business cycles. The behavior of the railroads in the 1880's, the automobile industry in the 1950's and the cyclical behavior of cement prices and price-cost margins support our theory. (J.E.L. Classification numbers:020, 130, 610).

Suggested Citation

  • Julio J. Rotemberg & Garth Saloner, 1984. "A Supergame-Theoretic Model of Business Cycles and Price Wars During Booms," NBER Working Papers 1412, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:1412
    Note: EFG
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w1412.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James W. Friedman, 1971. "A Non-cooperative Equilibrium for Supergames," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 38(1), pages 1-12.
    2. Grossman, Sanford J & Hart, Oliver D & Maskin, Eric S, 1983. "Unemployment with Observable Aggregate Shocks," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 91(6), pages 907-928, December.
    3. Robert H. Porter, 1983. "A Study of Cartel Stability: The Joint Executive Committee, 1880-1886," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 14(2), pages 301-314, Autumn.
    4. Mordecai Kurz, 1979. "A Strategic Theory of Inflation," NBER Working Papers 0379, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Lilien, David M, 1982. "Sectoral Shifts and Cyclical Unemployment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(4), pages 777-793, August.
    6. Green, Edward J & Porter, Robert H, 1984. "Noncooperative Collusion under Imperfect Price Information," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 52(1), pages 87-100, January.
    7. Abraham, Katharine G & Katz, Lawrence F, 1986. "Cyclical Unemployment: Sectoral Shifts or Aggregate Disturbances?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(3), pages 507-522, June.
    8. Rotemberg, Julio J, 1982. "Sticky Prices in the United States," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(6), pages 1187-1211, December.
    9. Long, John B, Jr & Plosser, Charles I, 1983. "Real Business Cycles," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 91(1), pages 39-69, February.
    10. Radner, Roy, 1980. "Collusive behavior in noncooperative epsilon-equilibria of oligopolies with long but finite lives," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 136-154, April.
    11. Porter, Robert H., 1983. "Optimal cartel trigger price strategies," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 29(2), pages 313-338, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Blog mentions

    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. Interpreting information, markups, and the economic cycle
      by Matt Nolan in TVHE on 2012-09-05 00:00:52

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Akbar Ullah & Ejaz Ghani & Attiya Y. Javed, 2013. "Market Power and Industrial Performance in Pakistan," PIDE-Working Papers 2013:88, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics.
    2. Bulan, Laarni & Mayer, Christopher & Somerville, C. Tsuriel, 2009. "Irreversible investment, real options, and competition: Evidence from real estate development," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(3), pages 237-251, May.
    3. Boone, Jan, 2002. "'Be Nice, Unless it Pays to Fight': A New Theory of Price Determination with Implications for Competition Policy," CEPR Discussion Papers 3342, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. David Genesove & Wallace P. Mullin, 1995. "Validating the Conjectural Variation Method: The Sugar Industry, 1890-1914," Working papers 95-20, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Department of Economics.
    5. Strausz, Roland, 2005. "Honest certification and the threat of capture," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 23(1-2), pages 45-62, February.
    6. Kollmann, Robert, 1997. "The cyclical behavior of mark ups in U.S. manufacturing and trade: new empirical evidence based on a model of optimal storage," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 57(3), pages 331-337, December.
    7. Federico S. Mandelman, 2006. "Business cycles: a role for imperfect competition in the banking system," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2006-21, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    8. Judith A. Chevalier & Anil K. Kashyap & Peter E. Rossi, 2003. "Why Don't Prices Rise During Periods of Peak Demand? Evidence from Scanner Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 15-37, March.
    9. Rafael Di Tella & Robert MacCulloch, 2002. "Informal Family Insurance And The Design Of The Welfare State," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(481), pages 481-503, July.
    10. Barsky, Robert & Bergen, Mark & Dutta, Shantanu & Levy, Daniel, 2003. "What Can the Price Gap between Branded and Private Label Products Tell Us about Markups?," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, pages 165-288.
    11. V. V. Chari & Patrick J. Kehoe, 1993. "Sustainable Plans and Mutual Default," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 60(1), pages 175-195.
    12. Mandelman, Federico S., 2010. "Business cycles and monetary regimes in emerging economies: A role for a monopolistic banking sector," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 122-138, May.
    13. Christian Stoff, 2004. "Establishing Cooperation between Groups: Ingroup versus Outgroup Punishment," SOI - Working Papers 0416, Socioeconomic Institute - University of Zurich, revised Feb 2006.
    14. Catherine J. Morrison, 1989. "Markup Behavior in Durable and Nondurable Manufacturing: A production Theory Approach," NBER Working Papers 2941, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Robert B. Barsky & Lutz Kilian, 2002. "Do We Really Know That Oil Caused the Great Stagflation? A Monetary Alternative," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2001, Volume 16, pages 137-198, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    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. Chaim Fershtman & Ariel Pakes, 2000. "A Dynamic Oligopoly with Collusion and Price Wars," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 31(2), pages 207-236, Summer.
    2. Gupta, Bishnupriya, 1997. "Collusion in the Indian Tea Industry in the Great Depression: An Analysis of Panel Data," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 155-173, April.
    3. Robert Gagné & Simon van Norden & Bruno Versaevel, 2003. "Testing Optimal Punishment Mechanisms Under Price Regulation: the Case of the Retail Market for Gasoline," CIRANO Working Papers 2003s-57, CIRANO.
    4. Holcomb, James H. & Nelson, Paul S., 1997. "The role of monitoring in duopoly market outcomes," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 79-93.
    5. Jean J. Gabszewicz & Jacques-François Thisse, 2000. "Microeconomic theories of imperfect competition," Cahiers d'Économie Politique, Programme National Persée, vol. 37(1), pages 47-99.
    6. Pedro Dal Bó, 2007. "Tacit collusion under interest rate fluctuations," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 38(2), pages 533-540, June.
    7. Pedro Dal Bo, 2002. "Three Essays on Repeated Games," Levine's Working Paper Archive 618897000000000038, David K. Levine.
    8. Kurz, Mordecai, 1985. "Cooperative oligopoly equilibrium," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 3-24, February.
    9. Kaplow, Louis & Shapiro, Carl, 2007. "Antitrust," Handbook of Law and Economics, in: A. Mitchell Polinsky & Steven Shavell (ed.), Handbook of Law and Economics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 15, pages 1073-1225, Elsevier.
    10. Bagwell, Kyle & Wolinsky, Asher, 2002. "Game theory and industrial organization," Handbook of Game Theory with Economic Applications, in: R.J. Aumann & S. Hart (ed.), Handbook of Game Theory with Economic Applications, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 49, pages 1851-1895, Elsevier.
    11. Mankiw, N Gregory, 1989. "Real Business Cycles: A New Keynesian Perspective," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 3(3), pages 79-90, Summer.
    12. Swanson Eric T, 2006. "The Relative Price and Relative Productivity Channels for Aggregate Fluctuations," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 6(1), pages 1-39, October.
    13. Wilson, Alistair J. & Wu, Hong, 2017. "At-will relationships: How an option to walk away affects cooperation and efficiency," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 487-507.
    14. Dagoumas, Athanasios & Perifanis, Theodosios & Polemis, Michael, 2017. "An econometric model to assess the Saudi Arabia crude oil strategy," MPRA Paper 86283, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Luís Cabral & Ali Hortacsu, 2004. "The Dynamics of Seller Reputation: Theory and Evidence from eBay," Working Papers 04-05, New York University, Leonard N. Stern School of Business, Department of Economics.
    16. van Damme, Eric, 1989. "Renegotiation-proof equilibria in repeated prisoners' dilemma," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 206-217, February.
    17. Osório-Costa, António M., 2009. "Efficiency Gains in Repeated Games at Random Moments in Time," MPRA Paper 13105, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Drew Fudenberg & David K. Levine, 2008. "An Approximate Folk Theorem with Imperfect Private Information," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Drew Fudenberg & David K Levine (ed.), A Long-Run Collaboration On Long-Run Games, chapter 14, pages 309-330, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    19. Gallice, Andrea, 2010. "The neglected effects of demand characteristics on the sustainability of collusion," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(4), pages 240-246, December.
    20. Pedro Dal Bó, 2005. "Cooperation under the Shadow of the Future: Experimental Evidence from Infinitely Repeated Games," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(5), pages 1591-1604, December.

    More about this item

    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:nbr:nberwo:1412. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.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.