In many markets, such as education, health care and public utilities, firms are often profit-constrained either due to regulation or because they have non-profit status. At the same time such firms might have altruistic concerns towards consumers. In this paper we study semi-altruistic firms’...

We investigate a Stackelberg oligopoly model in which m leaders and N-m followers compete. We find an asymmetric welfare implication of the Stackelberg model. Introducing a small number of leaders into the Cournot model can reduce welfare. However, introducing a small number of followers into...

The purpose of this paper is to provide a systematic treatment of tax policies in mixed markets with endogenous entry. We consider three types of tax-subsidy policies: a simple unit subsidy, an entry-license tax, and a policy mixture of the two instruments. Under the unit-subsidy policy, in...

We investigate optimal taxsubsidy policies in mixed and private oligopolies with excess burden of taxation. We compare the optimal subsidies and the resulting welfare levels among four regimes: mixed and private Cournot duopolies and Stackelberg competition with public and private leaderships....

This paper investigates how horizontal mergers affect the optimal entry barrier (tax) in the presence of free entry and exit. We show that the government should raise the entry tax when a merger reduces the total number of firms entering.

We study the effects of a hospital merger using a spatial competition framework with semialtruistic hospitals that invest in quality and expend cost-containment effort facing regulated prices. We find that the merging hospitals always reduce quality, whereas non-merging hospitals respond by...

Using a spatial competition framework with three ex ante identical firms, we study the effects of a horizontal merger on quality, price and welfare. The merging firms always reduce quality. They also increase prices if demand responsiveness to quality is sufficiently low. The non-merging firm,...

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...

Using a spatial competition framework with three ex ante identical firms, we study the effects of a horizontal merger on quality, price and welfare. The merging firms always reduce quality. They also increase prices if demand responsiveness to quality is sufficiently low. The non-merging firm,...