A long-standing conjecture is that winner-take-all games such as patent races lead to the survival of risk-takers and … the extinction of risk-averters. In many species a winner-take-all game determines the males' right to reproduce, and the … same argument suggests that males will evolve to be risk-takers. Psychological and sociological evidence buttresses the …

We study selection contests in which the strategic variable is degree of risk rather than amount of effort. The …

We provide empirical evidence that risk sharing enhances specialization in production. To the best of our knowledge … integration (a measure of risk sharing) within each of these groups of regions: The EC countries, the non-EC OECD countries, the …). Finally, we perform a regression of the specialization index on the degree of risk sharing, controlling for relevant economic …