Integrating Raiffa and Nash approaches to bargaining using interim agreements

Abstract

Raiffa's solution to the bargaining problem, outlined in Luce and Raiffa (1957), is the point where the negotiation curve - a sequence of points that constitute step-by-step improvements from the status quo in the feasible payoff space - meets (possibly in the limit) the efficient boundary of the feasible region. A bargaining model with interim agreements yields a negotiation curve in equilibrium (in the spirit of Raiffa), and as the bargaining frictions disappear, the Raiffa path of payoffs converges to the Nash solution.