Theoretical Economics 14 (2019), 849–886

This paper studies an N-person war of attrition which needs one exit for its ending. An N-person war of attrition is qualitatively different from its two-person version. Only in the former, the set of players who are actively engaged in a war of attrition may change over time. We introduce the possibility of a non-compromising type and characterize the unique equilibrium by identifying which players are actively involved in a war of attrition at each moment. We examine who is likely to exit and when the war of attrition ends quickly. As the leading example, we study how a group selects a volunteer in a dynamic setting.

Keywords: War of attrition, unique equilibrium

JEL classification: D71, C78