After the collapse of Japan′s “bubble economy” , many golf courses went bankrupt because of a lack of redemption money for membership. Therefore, there were many trials between the golf courses and their members related to the redemption. This research aimed to present one of the solutions to the problem of the membership redemption, using an experiment based on the ultimatum game.
The ultimatum game is often used in experimental economics. There are two players who do not know each other. They negotiate how to divide a windfall ; e.g. player #1 proposes how to divide the sum of the windfall between themselves, and player #2 can either accept or reject this proposal. If player #2 rejects the proposal, neither player receives anything. If player #2 accepts the proposal, both players receive money according to the proposal. This is one type of the bargaining games.
In this experiment, undergraduate students as subjects took the roles of the golf course owners and their members. This experiment compared the negotiation processes of the two groups with either their information disclosed or not, with regard to the financial conditions of the golf course. The results of this experiment indicated that asymmetric information influenced the negotiation between the golf course owners and their members. The members showed a tendency to be satisfied with a 30%-40% redemption from the golf course owners.
