Coordination with independent private values: Why pedestrians sometimes bump into each other
Christoph Kuzmics*
Last modified: 2014-04-05
Abstract
Motivated by trying to better understand the norms that govern pedestrian traffic, I study symmetric two-player coordination games with independent private values. The strategies of ``always pass on the left'' and ``always pass on the right'' are always equilibria of this game. Some such games, however, also have other (pure strategy) equilibria with a positive likelihood of mis-coordination. Perhaps surprisingly, in some such games, these Pareto-inefficient equilibria, with a positive likelihood of mis-coordination, are the only evolutionarily stable equilibria of the game.