American Economic Review Vol. 89 No. 5 1999
Using Field Experiments to Test Equivalence Between Auction Formats: Magic on the Internet
open access
Abstract
William Vickrey's predicted equivalences between first-price sealed-bid and Dutch auctions, and between second-price sealed-bid and English auctions, are tested using field experiments that auctioned off collectible trading cards over the Internet. The results indicate that the Dutch auction produces 30-percent higher revenues than the first-price auction format, a violation of the theoretical prediction and a reversal of previous laboratory results, and that the English and second-price formats produce roughly equivalent revenues.
- DOI
- 10.1257/aer.89.5.1063
- Volume
- 89
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 1063-1080
- Language
- en
- Sources
- bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref