Choosing One´s Identity
by
Dragan Filipovich
El Colegio de Mexico

This paper looks at whether it is possible for firms to differentiate themselves by choosing meaningless, worthless `tags' in the absence of exogenous rules preventing them from imitating each other. It shows that even when one can find a ranking of firms' products (from worse to better sell), `endogenous' differentiation of this sort might result. It emphasizes the role of partial pooling in achieving this, and shows that when not all buyers are able to observe all tags in the same way, the scope for such differentiation is substantially enhanced.

Date received: June 19, 2000

Copyright © 2000 by the author(s). The author(s) of this document and the organizers of the conference have granted their consent to include this abstract in Atlas Conferences Inc. Document # cafk-06.