We assess price dispersion in retail markets and its sources over time. Using a product-detailed price database, we document a consistent divergence of prices over time in retail markets in Uruguay: price dispersion increased by 3.1% in fifteen years. Next, we analyze microeconomic and...

There is limited theoretical understanding of cost pass-through within markets where prices are dispersed. Under a general demand function, we analyse the effects of cost changes in a seminal model of price dispersion, where some consumers are captive to particular sellers while others are not...

There is limited theoretical understanding of cost pass-through within markets where prices are dispersed. Under a general demand function, we analyse the effects of cost changes in a seminal model of price dispersion, where some consumers are captive to particular sellers while others are not...

We assess price dispersion in retail markets and its sources over time. Using a product-detailed price database, we document a consistent divergence of prices over time in retail markets in Uruguay: price dispersion increased by 3.1% in fifteen years. Next, we analyze microeconomic and...

Price comparison websites, where consumers can compare prices at a search cost that is close to zero, have become increasingly common around the world. Using daily information on prices, click-throughs, and the number of retailers for a sample of consumer electronics and durable goods over a...

We broaden and develop the classic captive-and-shopper model of sales. Firstly, we allow for asymmetric marginal costs as well as asymmetric captive audiences. These asymmetries jointly determine the identities of the two or more firms we find compete (via randomized sales) to serve shoppers. In...

Buyers and sellers in developing countries are often restricted from accessing distant markets by asymmetric price information and costly searches. Electronic marketplaces can reduce transaction costs and improve market performance. This study uses monthly panel data from 2000 to 2017 and...

We provide a theory of dynamic oligopoly pricing with heterogeneous price technologies, captured by the presence of trackers (on the firm-side) and shoppers (on the consumer-side) who can costlessly follow market prices. Our paper contributes to reconciling the variation in observed price...

We broaden and develop the classic captive-and-shopper model of sales. Firstly, we allow for asymmetric marginal costs as well as asymmetric captive audiences. These asymmetries jointly determine the identities of the two or more firms we find compete (via randomized sales) to serve shoppers. In...

Whereas between-retailer price discrepancies are well documented, less is known about price differentiations within a single chain. This article investigates the prevalence and the magnitude of online within-retailer price dispersion over time. Amazon is the US largest online food retailer (and...

COVID-19 has caused substantial disruptions to the airline industry. This paper analyzes the effects of competition variations related to the pandemic on price dispersion. The sample includes ticket information from the DB1B database between 2018Q1 and 2021Q4. The fixed-effect panel instrument...

The literature on liquidity traps suggests that a non-linear version of the new Keynesian model is better suited to capture the complex implications of the zero lower bound. However, our research reveals an exceptional level of price dispersion that exceeds previous empirical estimates by...

This paper examines a homogeneous-good Bertrand-Edgeworth oligopoly model to explore the role of firm size and number in pricing. We consider the price impact of merger, break up, investment, divestment, entry and exit. A merger leads to higher prices only when it increases the size of the...

In product markets, there exists substantial dispersion in prices for transactions of physically identical goods, and incumbent sellers sell at higher prices than entrants. This study develops a theory of dynamic pricing that explains these facts as results from the same fundamental friction:...

Agricultural commodity markets in developing countries are characterized by high transaction costs and risks that reduce trade flows among spatial markets. We examine whether institutionalized agricultural commodity exchange markets reduce transaction costs and hence spatial price dispersion...

We compile a new database of grocery prices in Argentina, with over 9 million observations per day. We find uniform pricing both within and across regions - i.e., product prices almost do not vary within stores of a chain. Uniform pricing implies that prices would not change with regional...

Although price dispersion remains a prominent feature of international and domestic markets, the development of e‐commerce has been increasingly promoting uniform pricing. Existing studies suggest that online competition, especially from Amazon, reduces price dispersion within individual...

We study a canonical model of decentralized exchange for a durable good or asset, where agents are assumed to have time-varying, heterogeneous utility types. Whereas the existing literature has focused on the special case of two types, we allow agents' utility to be drawn from an arbitrary...

We study a canonical model of decentralized exchange for a durable good or asset, where agents are assumed to have time-varying, heterogeneous utility types. Whereas the existing literature has focused on the special case of two types, we allow agents' utility to be drawn from an arbitrary...

In this paper, we study the effects of the spread of COVID-19 on retail and wholesale prices of urban markets in India, as well as price distortion between markets and the mark-up between retail and wholesale prices. Using fixed-effects panel regression models, we find that with the spread of...

We investigate the effect of COVID-19 epidemic and the subsequent stay-at-home order on market efficiency in China’s online markets, by comparing the changes in price dispersion around the date of the lockdown with the corresponding changes in the same period in the lunar year of 2019. We find...