TY - JOUR
T1 - On the origins of property rights
T2 - Conflict and production in the state of nature
AU - Hafer, Catherine
PY - 2006/1
Y1 - 2006/1
N2 - I analyse the emergence of property rights in a model of conflict and production in the absence of institutions of enforcement. The population of agents evolves dynamically through conflicts for possession of factor goods among pairs of randomly matched agents. Conflicts are incomplete information wars of attrition with an agent's type consisting of his or her independently drawn valuation of the prize and cost of competing for it. I prove equilibrium existence and show that in the steady state of the game, the population sorts into two stable groups (resource "haves" and "have-nots") in accordance with a known function of their primitive types.
AB - I analyse the emergence of property rights in a model of conflict and production in the absence of institutions of enforcement. The population of agents evolves dynamically through conflicts for possession of factor goods among pairs of randomly matched agents. Conflicts are incomplete information wars of attrition with an agent's type consisting of his or her independently drawn valuation of the prize and cost of competing for it. I prove equilibrium existence and show that in the steady state of the game, the population sorts into two stable groups (resource "haves" and "have-nots") in accordance with a known function of their primitive types.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=33646678641&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=33646678641&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1111/j.1467-937X.2006.00371.x
DO - 10.1111/j.1467-937X.2006.00371.x
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:33646678641
SN - 0034-6527
VL - 73
SP - 119
EP - 143
JO - Review of Economic Studies
JF - Review of Economic Studies
IS - 1
ER -