Experimental methods are now a mainstream empirical methodology in economics. The papers in this volume represent some recent developments in research on experimental markets. The articles span a variety of topics related to experimental markets, including auctions, taxation, institutional differences, coordination in markets, and learning. Contributors to the volume include many of the most distinguished researchers in the area.
A small but increasing number of economists have begun to use laboratory experiments to evaluate economic propositions under carefully controlled conditions. Experimental Economics is the first comprehensive treatment of this rapidly growing area of research. While the book acknowledges that laboratory experiments are no panacea, it argues cogently for their effectiveness in selected situations. Covering methodological and procedural issues as well as theory, Experimental Economics is not only a textbook but also a useful introduction to laboratory methods for professional economists. Although the authors present some new material, their emphasis is on organizing and evaluating existing results. The book can be used as an anchoring device for a course at either the graduate or advanced undergraduate level. Applications include financial market experiments, oligopoly price competition, auctions, bargaining, provision of public goods, experimental games, and decision making under uncertainty. The book also contains instructions for a variety of laboratory experiments.
Praise for Paving Wall Street "This is a remarkable book that weaves the deep scientific roots of modern finance and modern financial institutions with humorous perspective and considerable wisdom. Few understand the pervasive and complex economic principles that govern our world of finance. Few are aware of the academic and scientific origins of financial practices and market instruments that are commonplace today. Ross Miller uses his experience and talents acquired as an experimental economist to help us understand a world that is contradictory, potentially dangerous, and paradoxical. He entertains us while doing it." --Charles R. Plott, Edward S. Harkness Professor of Economics and Political Science, California Institute of Technology "Decisions by millions of individuals produce the fierce tides and churning seas of Wall Street. Miller wields his microscope in the laboratory of experimental economics to provide a sprightly and insightful analysis of investor behavior." --Richard Zeckhauser, Frank P. Ramsey Professor of Political Economy, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University "Dramatic new ways for buying and selling-spectrum auctions, e-commerce, derivatives-are the economics profession's contribution to the Information Revolution. This book explains how many of these innovations began with simple experiments at Caltech. The style is a refreshing combination-dramatic and fun to read, but also historically and scientifically accurate. So, I can send one to my Dad, a salesman, and another to my girlfriend, a patent attorney." --Colin Camerer, Rea and Lela Axline Professor of Business Economics, California Institute of Technology "Paving Wall Street is a first-rate insight into bubbles and the experimental research performed on the topic by leading academicians such as Vernon Smith." --David Dreman, Chairman, Dreman Value Management "Academic ideas have revolutionized how Wall Street operates. Entirely new markets have been created. This revolution continues today, accelerated by the rise of increasingly automated markets. Ross Miller has produced a book that makes the leading-edge financial and economic thinking that shapes these new markets accessible to practitioners and professionals. With no equations and a deft touch, this is an excellent guide to the future of greater Wall Street." --David J. Leinweber, PhD, Economics/Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology
While the field of economics makes sharp distinctions and produces precise theory, the work of experimental economics sometimes appears blurred and may produce uncertain results. The contributors to this volume have provided brief notes describing specific experimental results.
This book, which comprises eight chapters, presents a comprehensive critical survey of the results and methods of laboratory experiments in economics. The first chapter provides an introduction to experimental economics as a whole, with the remaining chapters providing surveys by leading practitioners in areas of economics that have seen a concentration of experiments: public goods, coordination problems, bargaining, industrial organization, asset markets, auctions, and individual decision making. The work aims both to help specialists set an agenda for future research and to provide nonspecialists with a critical review of work completed to date. Its focus is on elucidating the role of experimental studies as a progressive research tool so that wherever possible, emphasis is on series of experiments that build on one another. The contributors to the volume--Colin Camerer, Charles A. Holt, John H. Kagel, John O. Ledyard, Jack Ochs, Alvin E. Roth, and Shyam Sunder--adopt a particular methodological point of view: the way to learn how to design and conduct experiments is to consider how good experiments grow organically out of the issues and hypotheses they are designed to investigate.
This book describes a laboratory experiment designed to test the causes and properties of bubbles in financial markets and explores the question whether it is possible to design markets which avoid such bubbles and crashes. In the experiment, subjects were given the opportunity to trade in a stock market modeled after the seminal work of Smith et al. (1988). To account for the increasing importance of online betting sites, subjects were also allowed to trade in a digital option market. The outcomes shed new light on how subjects form and update their expectations, placing special emphasis on the bounded rationality of investors. Various analytical bubble measures found in the literature are collected, calculated, classified and presented for the first time. The very interesting new bubble measures "Dispersion Ratio", "Overpriced Transactions" and "Underpriced Transactions" are developed, making the book an important step towards the research goal of preventing bubbles and crashes in financial markets.
This book provides an easy to follow guide to economic experiments and specifically those that explore notions of fairness, altruism and trust in economic transactions and how findings in the field can change the way we approach a variety of economic problems.
Citizens are caught in a paradox. Voting levels are falling, there are growing feelings of powerlessness, social unfairness and yet citizens are constantly told that they have more choice as well as greater freedom and liberty. This book brilliantly explains these discrepancies. It shows that the new definitions of freedom as responsibility to create prosperity through markets is seriously distorting citizenship whilst appearing to be unbiased and neutral. It exposes inconsistencies in the market-based and apolitical vision of our collective future. This book: outlines how market citizenship involves a new kind of rationality in which citizens are defined as individualized utility maximizers shows how the idea that citizens act primarily to develop their narrow self-interest has encouraged the creation of competitive governance mechanisms analyses how market mechanisms are used to decide who are ′winners′ and ′losers′ - from the loss of youth groups funding to global treaties discussess the shortfalls when key contemporary issues are tackled through ′win-win′ solutions with business working alongside consumers, with little or no role for government explaims how localism and the devolution of power is being used to support the status quo. suggests new kinds of engagement are emerging because markets have undermined politics. Essential reading for students, policy-makers and researchers of citizenship within sociology, politics, economics, geography and social policy.
Economists, psychologists, and marketers are interested in determining the monetary value people place on non-market goods for a variety of reasons: to carry out cost-benefit analysis, to determine the welfare effects of technological innovation or public policy, to forecast new product success, and to understand individual and consumer behavior. Unfortunately, many currently available techniques for eliciting individuals' values suffer from a serious problem in that they involve asking individuals hypothetical questions about intended behavior. Experimental auctions circumvent this problem because they involve individuals exchanging real money for real goods in an active market. This represents a promising means for eliciting non-market values. Lusk and Shogren provide a comprehensive guide to the theory and practice of experimental auctions. It will be a valuable resource to graduate students, practitioners and researchers concerned with the design and utilization of experimental auctions in applied economic and marketing research.
