Overconfidence and Excess Entry: An Experimental Approach
通过实验探讨过度自信（人们高估自身能力）是否可预测地影响经济行为，特别是进入竞争性游戏或市场的决策，为解释新企业高失败率提供行为视角。
Psychological studies show that most people are overconfident about their own relative abilities, and unreasonably optimistic about their futures (e.g. Shelly E. Taylor and J.D. Brown, 1988; Neil D. Weinstein, 1980). When assessing their position in a distribution of peers on almost any positive trait-- like driving ability (Ola Svenson, 1981 ), income prospects, or longevity-- a vast majority of people say they are above the average, although of course, only half can be (if the trait is symmetrically distributed). This paper explores whether optimistic biases could plausibly and predictably influence economic behavior in one particular setting-- entry into competitive games or markets. Many empirical studies show that most new businesses fail within a few years. For example, using plant level data from the U.S. Census of Manufacturers spanning 1963-1982, Timothy Dunne et al. (1988) estimated that 61.5 percent of all entrants exited within five years and 79.6 percent exited within 10 years. Most of these exits are failures (see also Dunne et al., 1989a, 1989b; D. Shapiro and R.S. Khemani, 1987).