If bidders are uncertain whether the auctioneer sticks to the announced reserve, some bidders respond by strategic non-participation, speculating that the auctioneer may revoke the reserve. However, the reserve inadvertently signals the auctioneer's type, which drives a unique separating and a...

A principal uses security bid auctions to award an incentive contract to one among several agents in the presence of hidden action and hidden information. Securities range from cash to equity and call options. "Steeper" securities are better surplus extractors that narrow the gap between the two...

In a spatial competition setting there is usually a non-negative relationship between competition and quality. In this paper we offer a novel mechanism whereby competition leads to lower quality. This mechanism relies on two key assumptions, namely that the providers are motivated and...

We study the implications of credit constraints for the sustainability of product market collusion in a bank-financed oligopoly in which firms face an imperfect credit market. We consider two situations, without and with credit rationing, i.e., with a binding credit limit. When there is credit...

We study competition among a score of firms participating in an online market for a commodity computer component. Firms were able to adjust prices continuously; prices determined how the firms were ranked and listed (lowest price listed first), with better ranks contributing to firms' sales....

In the large literature on firm performance, economists have given little attention to entrepreneurs. We use deaths of more than 500 entrepreneurs as a source of exogenous variation, and ask whether this variation can explain shifts in firm performance. Using longitudinal data, we find large and...

We examine the strategic interaction in the market for physician services when the total budget for reimbursement is fixed. We show that this prospective payment system involves { compared to a fee-for-service remuneration system { a severe coordination problem, which potentially leads to the...

We study price dynamics for computer components sold on a price-comparison website. Our fine-grained data - a year of hourly price data for scores of rival retailers - allow us to estimate a dynamic model of competition, backing out structural estimates of managerial frictions. The estimated...

We develop a model of spatial competition with two heterogeneous in their market access chains, choosing between third-degree price discrimination in their local markets (flexible pricing) and a unified chain-level price (uniform pricing). The markets are interconnected with each other via...

This paper explores why competing firms can choose to outsource to an external common supplier that does not have a cost advantage in input production. The supplier, through its contract offers, manages to generate asymmetry, to alter product market competition, and to extract profits from the...