Free Trade, Autarky And The Sustainability Of An International Environmental Agreement

We determine the impact of free trade on the sustainability of an international environmental agreement (IEA) and incorporate it into the assessment of the net benefits of opening up to free trade. We show that such an analysis can reverse the conclusions reached within a standard one-shot game framework. First, we examine a one shot game and argue that the benefits from an increase in economic activity due to free trade outweigh the extra cost of free trade associated with larger environmental damage. Then, we analyze the infinite repetition of the one-shot game where countries can use trigger strategies and show that there exist circumstances where an IEA is sustainable under autarky but not under free trade. This aggravates the environmental damages caused by free trade and leads to the possibility that autarky may welfare dominate free trade. This conclusion remains valid even when countries adopt the most cooperative environmental policy when the "fully cooperative" environmental policy is not sustainable.

Free Trade, Autarky And The Sustainability Of An International Environmental Agreement

We determine the impact of free trade on the sustainability of an international environmental agreement (IEA) and incorporate it into the assessment of the net benefits of opening up to free trade. We show that such an analysis can reverse the conclusions reached within a standard one-shot game framework. First, we examine a one shot game and argue that the benefits from an increase in economic activity due to free trade outweigh the extra cost of free trade associated with larger environmental damage. Then, we analyze the infinite repetition of the one-shot game where countries can use trigger strategies and show that there exist circumstances where an IEA is sustainable under autarky but not under free trade. This aggravates the environmental damages caused by free trade and leads to the possibility that autarky may welfare dominate free trade. This conclusion remains valid even when countries adopt the most cooperative environmental policy when the "fully cooperative" environmental policy is not sustainable.

Group cooperation against a hegemon

In this paper, I study the ability of a group of citizens to cooperate against a hegemon in a repeated contest game and where group members and the hegemon have different valuations of the prize. I first consider that group members use grim trigger strategies (GTSs) to support cooperative behavior and show that full cooperation within the group is more easily sustained as a stationary subgame perfect (Nash) equilibrium (SSPE) as either group size or the heterogeneity in the valuation of the prize increases. In turn, I show that full cooperation within the group can also be sustained as a weakly renegotiation-proof equilibrium (WRPE). However, an increase in group size makes it more difficult to sustain within-group cooperation, but an increase in the relative valuation of the prize by group members still facilitates group cooperation.

Indirect reciprocity with simple records

Indirect reciprocity is a foundational mechanism of human cooperation. Existing models of indirect reciprocity fail to robustly support social cooperation: Image-scoring models fail to provide robust incentives, while social-standing models are not informationally robust. Here we provide a model of indirect reciprocity based on simple, decentralized records: Each individual’s record depends on the individual’s own past behavior alone, and not on the individual’s partners’ past behavior or their partners’ partners’ past behavior. When social dilemmas exhibit a coordination motive (or strategic complementarity), tolerant trigger strategies based on simple records can robustly support positive social cooperation and exhibit strong stability properties. In the opposite case of strategic substitutability, positive social cooperation cannot be robustly supported. Thus, the strength of short-run coordination motives in social dilemmas determines the prospects for robust long-run cooperation.

Health literacy and ehealth tools to improve quality of life

Introdution The use of smartphones and apps to achieve numerous goals, has reached a vast number of citizens today in the world. Health related apps (HAPPS) (estimated to be 318.500 in 2017) have become popular, but little is known about their real impact in public health. The goal of this research is to understand what are the most common used HAPPS, how health literacy (HL) mediates their use and to what extent do they contribute to quality of life. Metods The study is observational, cross-sectional and includes both quantitative and qualitative data from an adult population working in the financial corporation. By the means of a survey (CAWI) data was collected about HL (using the European Health Literacy Survey validated to Portugal ((HLS-EU-PT), the use of apps and their influence on quality of life. The sample (n = 748) includes participants from the different offices of the company in Portugal main land and its autonomous territories. Results In this study (58.7% males) 40% of the individuals have between 36 and 45 years old, and 9.2% refer the use of health promotion apps. Of the participants, 7.1% have inadequate, 39.0% problematic, 36.6% sufficient and 17.3% excellent HL (HLS-EU-PT). Content analysis showed the categories most common in this sample were apps for running 44.9% (58.1% males) and health monitoring 26.1% (with 55.6% males). Those who use apps have a slightly higher value of HL than those who don’t use, but this difference is not statistically significant. Conclusions In this sample not more than 10% of individuals are using apps to promote their wellbeing. Implementing research focusing HL, quality of life and the use of mhealth tools is a new field in public health and allow researchers to identify trends that may trigger strategies to implement health promoting strategies in the work setting. More research is needed to understand how mhealth shape the everyday lives of prosumers in their quest for wellbeing.

Trigger Strategies for Standard Diffusion in Interorganizational Networks

When establishing a new technological standard, multiple actors often have to build coalitions to overcome the inertia of the emergent collaboration network and to mobilize decisive levels of support. The authors suggest that the emergence of a standard in a networked field can be strategically influenced by focusing only on a subset of all actors. The study defined the choice of a specific set of standard-initializing organizations as the trigger strategy. A conceptual model was developed from interorganizational collaboration as a network comprised of a set of heterogeneous, interconnected nodes, qualified by their group membership and size. The authors employed network simulations identifying the value of different trigger strategies. Data on a network of airline collaboration was used to illustrate the model. Under most conditions considered, the study found a strong triggering potential of interrelated core cliques in comparison to other trigger strategies. The results suggest that this strategy should receive more attention in the future.

How Should Cartels React to Entry Triggered by Demand Growth?

We study the sustainability of collusion with optimal penal codes in markets where demand growth triggers the entry of a new firm. In contrast to grim trigger strategies, optimal penal codes make collusion easier to sustain before entry than after. This conclusion is robust to changes in the number of entrants and to the consideration of price-setting instead of quantity-setting. A comparison is given between different reactions of the incumbents to entry in terms of sustainability of collusion, incumbents’ profits, entrant’s profits, consumer surplus and social welfare. One of our findings is that the incumbent firms may prefer competition to collusion.

Can exit prizes induce lame ducks to shirk less? Experimental evidence

Elected representatives serving their final period face only weak incentives to provide costly effort. However, overlapping generations (OLG) models suggest that exit prizes sustained by trigger strategies can induce representatives in their final period to provide such effort. We evaluate this hypothesis using a simple OLG public good experiment, the central treatment being whether exit prizes are permitted. We find that a significantly higher number of subjects in their final period contribute when exit prizes are permitted. However, this result does not originate from use of trigger strategies. More likely explanations include gift-exchange and focal-point effects.