Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Burkhard Schipper
Author-Name-First: Burkhard
Author-Name-Last: Schipper
Author-Name: Peter Duersch
Author-Name-First: Peter
Author-Name-Last: Duersch
Author-Name: Joerg Oechssler
Author-Name-First: Joerg
Author-Name-Last: Oechssler
Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economics, University of California Davis
Title: Unbeatable Imitation
Abstract: We show that for many classes of symmetric two-player games, the simple decision rule ``imitate-if-better'' can hardly be beaten by any strategy. We provide necessary and sufficient conditions for imitation to be unbeatable in the sense that there is no strategy that can exploit imitation as a money
 pump. In particular, imitation is subject to a money pump if and only if the relative payoff function of the game is of the rock-scissors-paper variety. We also show that a sufficient condition for imitation not being subject to a money pump is that the relative payoff game is a generalized ordinal
 potential game or a quasiconcave game. Our results apply to many interesting examples of symmetric games including 2 x 2 games, Cournot duopoly, price competition, public goods games, common pool resource games, and
 minimum effort coordination games.
Length: 18
File-URL: https://repec.dss.ucdavis.edu/files/Vx4yJ6Q5GWqet6ho2hTBLUCL/12-5.pdf
File-Format: application/pdf
Number: 44
Classification-JEL: C72, C73, D43
KeyWords: Imitate-the-best, learning, symmetric games, relative payoffs, zero-sum games, rock-paper-scissors, finite population ESS, generalized ordinal potential games, quasiconcave games
Creation-Date: 20120416
Handle: RePEc:cda:wpaper:44