TY - JOUR
T1 - Correlated equilibria in homogenous good Bertrand competition
AU - Jann, Ole
AU - Schottmüller, Christoph
PY - 2015/3/1
Y1 - 2015/3/1
N2 - We show that there is a unique correlated equilibrium, identical to the unique Nash equilibrium, in the classic Bertrand oligopoly model with homogeneous goods and identical marginal costs. This provides a theoretical underpinning for the so-called "Bertrand paradox" as well as its most general formulation to date. Our proof generalizes to asymmetric marginal costs and arbitrarily many players in the following way: The market price cannot be higher than the second lowest marginal cost in any correlated equilibrium.
AB - We show that there is a unique correlated equilibrium, identical to the unique Nash equilibrium, in the classic Bertrand oligopoly model with homogeneous goods and identical marginal costs. This provides a theoretical underpinning for the so-called "Bertrand paradox" as well as its most general formulation to date. Our proof generalizes to asymmetric marginal costs and arbitrarily many players in the following way: The market price cannot be higher than the second lowest marginal cost in any correlated equilibrium.
KW - Faculty of Social Sciences
KW - Bertrand paradox
KW - correlated equilibrium
KW - price competition
U2 - 10.1016/j.jmateco.2015.01.005
DO - 10.1016/j.jmateco.2015.01.005
M3 - Journal article
SN - 0304-4068
VL - 57
SP - 31
EP - 37
JO - Journal of Mathematical Economics
JF - Journal of Mathematical Economics
ER -