ASYMMETRIC CONTESTS WITH GENERALTECHNOLOGIES

We investigate the Nash equilibria of asymmetric, winner-take-all, imperfectlydiscriminating contests, focussing on existence, uniqueness and rentdissipation. When the contest success function is determined by a productionfunction with decreasing returns for each contestant, equilibria areunique. If marginal product is also bounded, limiting total expenditure isequal to the value of the prize in large contests even if contestants di¤er.Partial dissipation can occur only when in…nite marginal products are permitted.Our analysis relies heavily on the use of ‘share functions’ and wediscuss their theory and application. Increasing returns typically introducesmultiple equilibria and requires an extension of share functions to correspondences...