We examine recent claims that a particular Q-learning algorithm used by competitors 'autonomously' and systematically learns to collude, resulting in supracompetitive prices and extra profits for the firms sustained by collusive equilibria. A detailed analysis of the inner workings of this...

International standards have the potential to both promote and hinder international trade. Yet empirical scholarship on the standards-trade relationship has been held up due to some methodological challenges: measurement problems, varied effects, and endogeneity concerns. We are able to surmount...

International standards have the potential to both promote and hinder international trade. Yet empirical scholarship on the standards-trade relationship has been held up due to some methodological challenges: measurement problems, varied effects, and endogeneity concerns. We are able to surmount...

When there are competing technologies or products with unknown payoffs an important question is which technology will prevail and whether technologies with different payoffs can coexist in the long run. In this paper, we use a social learning model with local interactions to study this question....

The paper analyzes the problem of protocol coordination between two firms, where one firm has private information about its own protocol. The institutional characteristics of the market and the class of strategies adopted by the firms admit multiple equilibria in the market. Of these, one...