The fixed-price-offer (FPO) mechanism in <italic>Trade Me</italic> auctions allows sellers to make a take-it-or-leave-it offer at the conclusion of an unsuccessful auction. Weinvestigate the effects of the FPO option on strategies and outcomes in independent-value auctions. The FPO option induces some bidders...

This article is concerned with models in which an agent faces a lottery with <italic>j</italic> other agents for a prize, so that the probability of winning the prize is 1/(<italic>j</italic> + 1), and where <italic>j</italic> is stochastic. After describing four different situations where such a lottery is present, we construct the expected...

In a standard English auction in which bidders’ valuations are independently drawn from a common distribution, a standard regularity condition is that the survivor function of the distribution be log concave. In an auction where the seller sets a fixed price, the equivalent condition requires...

The Fixed Price Offer (FPO) mechanism in Trade Me auctions allows sellers to make a take-it-or-leave-it offer at the conclusion of an unsuccessful auction. We investigate the effects of the FPO option on strategies and outcomes in independent-value auctions. The FPO option induces some bidders...

A recent paper has suggested a reason why there might be a lasting trade-off between inflation and unemployment at low inflation rates. This has led some economists to recommend that Canada increase its inflation rate. The idea underlying this view is that, because firms are reluctant to cut...

The Bank of Canada uses core CPI inflation, the year-over-year rate of change of the consumer price index excluding food, energy, and the effects of changes in indirect taxes, as the operational guide for monetary policy. In this report we study the concept and measurement of core or underlying...

A recent paper has suggested there might be a trade-off between inflation and unemployment at low inflation rates and this has led some economists to recommend that Canada increase its inflation rate. Underlying this view is the idea that, because firms are reluctant to cut workers' nominal...

Consider the class of games in which each player chooses a strategy from a connected subset of the real line. Many oligopoly models fall into this class. In many of these applications, it would be useful to show that an equilibrium was unique, or at least to have a set of conditions under which...