Asymmetries in rent seeking

In rent-seeking contests, players are seldom identical to one another. In this chapter, we examine the rent-seeking literature that explores the effects of specific forms of asymmetry between contestants. We consider Tullock’s rent-seeking contests involving two players who differ in strength (marginal returns to effort), motivation (valuations of the sought-after rent) and cunning (bargaining power). We study the combined interaction of these three possible forms of asymmetry in rent-seeking. We examine how these asymmetries affect the rent-seeking contest and investigate the effect of ex post trading opportunities on the players’ efforts and probabilities of winning and on the social costs of rent-seeking.