Less fighting than expected — experiments with wars of attrition and all-pay auctions.

The paper compares with the help of experiments dynamic and static wars of attrition (i.e. second price all-pay auctions) and first-price all-pay auctions. While most experimental studies find overbidding in first-price all-pay auctions, we find underbidding in a similar institution, the war of attrition, in particular if the bidding process is dynamic. We study bids and revenue in different experimental frames and matching procedures and draw a link to the literature on stepwise linear bidding functions