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European Symposium on Algorithms

ESA 2009: Algorithms - ESA 2009 pp 251–262Cite as

On the Performance of Approximate Equilibria in Congestion Games

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 5757))

Abstract

We study the performance of approximate Nash equilibria for congestion games with polynomial latency functions. We consider how much the price of anarchy worsens and how much the price of stability improves as a function of the approximation factor ε. We give almost tight upper and lower bounds for both the price of anarchy and the price of stability for atomic and non-atomic congestion games. Our results not only encompass and generalize the existing results of exact equilibria to ε-Nash equilibria, but they also provide a unified approach which reveals the common threads of the atomic and non-atomic price of anarchy results. By expanding the spectrum, we also cast the existing results in a new light.

Supported in part by IST-15964 (AEOLUS) and IST-2008-215270 (FRONTS).

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Max-Planck-Institut für Informatik, Saarbrücken, Germany

    George Christodoulou

  2. Department of Informatics, University of Athens, Greece

    Elias Koutsoupias

  3. Computer Engineering and Informatics Department, Patras University, Greece

    Paul G. Spirakis

Authors
  1. George Christodoulou
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  2. Elias Koutsoupias
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  3. Paul G. Spirakis
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. School of Computer Science, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel

    Amos Fiat

  2. Fakultät für Informatik, Universität Karlsruhe (TH), Am Fasanengarten 5, 76131, Karlsruhe, Germany

    Peter Sanders

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© 2009 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Christodoulou, G., Koutsoupias, E., Spirakis, P.G. (2009). On the Performance of Approximate Equilibria in Congestion Games. In: Fiat, A., Sanders, P. (eds) Algorithms - ESA 2009. ESA 2009. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 5757. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-04128-0_22

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-04128-0_22

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-04127-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-04128-0

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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