Professionals Play Minimax

• Autores: Ignacio Palacios Huerta
• Localización: Abstracts of the Fifth Spanish Meeting on Game Theory and Applications / coord. por Jesús Mario Bilbao Arrese, Francisco Ramón Fernández García, 2002, ISBN 84-472-0733-1, pág. 89
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • During the last few decades game theory has contributed to a reshaping of important aspects of the methodology of Economics and other social sciences.

    In large part this is because the language, concepts, and techniques of noncooperative game theory have become central to many areas of the discipline.

    Undoubtedly, studying the interaction of ideally rational players greatly aids our understanding of the behavior of real individuals, firms and other agents.

    Moreover, as Kreps (1991) remarks, "studying the former should aim at understanding the latter. The point of game theory is to help economists understand and predict what will happen in economic, social and political contexts." Theoretical contributions should thus feed back to empirical analysis. However, testing the implications of the theory has proven extremely difficult in the literature. The primary reason is that many predictions often hinge on properties of the utility functions and the values of the rewards used. Even when predictions are invariant over classes of preferences, data on rewards are seldom available in natural settings. Moreover, there is often great difficulty in determining strategy sets and in measuring individuals� choices, effort levels, and the incentive structures they face. As a result, even the most fundamental predictions of game-theoretical models have not been supported empirically in real situations yet.