Models for Hierarchial Decisions Involving Inventories

Abstract

Models that facilitate analysis of decision making in hierarchial systems, for example involving wholesalers and retailers, can ultimately be of significance not only to academic people concerned with economics, distribution and production but to others as well. The whole idea of a hierarchy of interdependent decision processes within a system may be more realistic for many purposes than some of the more widespread single decision concepts. The focus on inventory decisions, as one class of a potentially larger species, provides both a tangible beginning and a problem area where some mathematical work has been done. The purpose is to explain a relatively single model as a means of establishing the need for theory in this area and the potentially useful though unexplored generalizations from this model.