15.040 | Spring 2004 | Graduate

Game Theory for Managers

Readings

In the list of readings below, D&S = Dixit, Avinash K., and Susan Skeath. Games of Strategy. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company, 1999. ISBN: 0393974219.

All students should become comfortable with material assigned in the textbook prior to each class. Students with less background will need to spend more time on this. Non-textbook readings that are most important to prepare for lecture are denoted with (*) or (**). (All readings are very helpful for getting as much as possible from the lecture.)

LEC # TOPICS READINGS
1 Introduction (*) Smith, Raymond. “Business as a War Game: A Report from the Battlefront.” Fortune, September 1996, 190-2.

Brandenburger, Adam, and Vijay Krishna. “The Gray Area: Common Sense 0, Strategic Reasoning 6.” Harvard Business Review 90, no. 4: 200-201.

D&S. Chapter 1.

2 Rationality? Hirshleifer, David. “The Blind Leading the Blind: Social Influence, Fads, and Informational Cascades.” Chapter 12 in The New Economics of Human Behavior. Edited by Mariano Tomassi, and Kathryn Ierulli. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995. ISBN: 0521479495.

Lowenstein, Roger. “Exuberance Is Rational.” The New York Times Magazine, 11 February 2001.

(*) Buffett, Warren. “The Billionaire’s Buyout Plan.” The New York Times, 10 September 2000.

D&S. Chapter 2, and 4 - 4.6.

3 Equilibrium I Hobson, Katherine. “The Malls Get Decked: Retailers Minding Too Many Stores.” The Street.com, 22 November 2000. Available at the Web site of The Street.com.

(*) Peterson, Ivars. “Mating Games and Lizards.” Mathematical Association of America, 15 April 1996, (accessed July 12, 2004).

Glen, Orie. “Koufax Kicks.” SportsJones Magazine, 21 July 1998.

D&S. Chapter 4.10 - 4.12, 5 - 5.4, 8.6, 10.3 - 10.4.

4 Equilibrium II Garicano, Luis. “Game Theory: How to Make It Pay.” Financial Times, 11 October 1999, 2.

(*) Garicano, Luis, and Robert Gertner. “The Dynamics of Price Competition.” Financial Times, 18 October 1999, 2.

D&S. Chapter 3 - 3.7.

5 Commitment (*) Chevalier, Judith. “When It Can Be Good to Burn Your Boats.” Financial Times, 25 October 1999, 12.

Lieberman, Marvin B., and David B. Montgomery. “First-Mover Advantages.” Strategic Management Journal 9 (1988): 41-58.

Schelling, Thomas. Strategy of Conflict. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1963, chapter 10. ISBN: 0674840305.

D&S. Chapter 9.

6 Strategic Substitutes and Strategic Complements (**) Lecture Note on Strategic Substitutes and Strategic Complements.
7 Application: Entering a Market (**) Rivkin, Jan W. “Dogfight over Europe: RyanAir (A).” Boston, MA: Harvard Business School, 2000, Case No. 9-700-115.

Chevalier, Judith. “The Pros and Cons of Entering a Market.” Financial Times, 1 November 1999, 8-10.

8 Application: Brinksmanship Schelling, Thomas. Strategy of Conflict. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1963, chapters 7 and 8.

D&S. Chapter 13.

9 Auctions (*) Michaels, Daniel. “Dogfight: In the Secret World of Airplane Deals, One Battle Up Close - Boeing, Airbus Vied to Meet Cutthroat Terms of Iberia.” The Wall Street Journal, 10 March 2003.

McMillan, John. “Selling Spectrum Rights.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 8 (Summer 1994): 145-62.

(*) Lecture Note on Auction Theory.

D&S. Chapter 15.

10 Uncertainty and Information Loughran, Tim, and Jay Ritter. “The New Issues Puzzle.” Journal of Finance 50, no. 1 (1995): 23-51.

Easterbrook, Frank. “Two Agency-Cost Explanations of Dividends.” American Economic Review 74, no. 4 (1984): 650-9.

D&S. Chapter 12.

11 Reputation and Strategic Irrationality (*) Kreps, David M. Microeconomics for Managers. W.W. Norton & Company, 2004, chapter 23, pp. 556-73. ISBN: 0393976793.

D&S. Chapter 8.1 - 8.5.

Course Info

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Spring 2004
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Lecture Notes
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