Vollkommene Konkurrenz auf Märkten ist dadurch charakterisiert, dass die Handlungen einzelner Wirtschaftssubjekte für alle anderen Wirtschaftssubjekte irrelevant sind. Jeder Einzelne kann das Gesamtergebnis (z.B. die Preise) auf einem Markt nicht unmittelbar beeinflussen; im Begriff des...

We analyze oligopolistic third-degree price discrimination relative to uniform pricing, when markets are always covered. Pricing equilibria are critically determined by supply-side features such as the number of firms and their marginal cost differences. It follows that each firm's Lerner index...

This paper uses a discrete-time partial equilibrium model of the European Emissions Trading System (EU ETS)to analyze the impact of the recent reform on allowance prices. By including bounded rationality such as myopia or hedging requirements, we find that the Hotelling price path is no longer...

This paper examines the impact of trade liberalization on firms' product and labor market power. We estimate the prevalence and intensity of firm-level price-cost markups and either wage markups or wage markdowns. We take the dependence between these model-consistent measures of product and...

This paper explores how firms that lack expertise in machine learning (ML) can leverage the so-called AI flywheel effect. This effect designates a virtuous cycle by which, as an ML product is adopted and new user data are fed back to the algorithm, the product improves, enabling further...

We develop a New Keynesian (NK) model with endogenous price setting frequency. Whether a firm updates its price in a given period depends on an analysis of expected cost and benefits modelled by a discrete choice process. A firm decides to update the price when expected benefits outweigh...

Standard theories of price adjustment are based on the problem of a single-product firm, and therefore they may not be well suited to analyze price dynamics in the economy with multiproduct firms. To guide new theory, we study a unique dataset with comprehensive coverage of daily prices in large...

We provide a theory of how RPM facilitate upstream cartels absent any information asymmetries using a model with manufacturer and retailer competition. Because retailers have an effective outside option to each manufacturer’s contract, the manufacturers can only ensure contract acceptance by...

Dynamic pricing is a widely employed pricing strategy for goods and services in which firms flexibly set prices, taking into account current market conditions. This paper studies theoretically and empirically the role of this pricing strategy in explaining the heterogeneous response of consumer...

This paper investigates price patterns of off-patent pharmaceuticals in Sweden. I show that price dynamics are dependent on the number of competitors in the market. The price patterns follow predictions from a model of dynamic price competition in which the demand for pharmaceuticals...

We study the social welfare implications of early termination fees in the US wireless industry. It is hypothesized that the elimination of long-term contracts at the end of 2015 was a transition from one market equilibrium to another. We use a theoretical model to illustrate that the endogenous...

After establishing that exporters obtain higher margins than non-exporters, the paper takes a new look at export premia by comparing multi-product exporters' costs, prices and markups on the domestic and foreign markets. This firm-product-market analysis is made possible thanks to a unique...

We study planned price changes in German firm-level survey data to infer the relative importance of supply and demand during the Covid-19 pandemic. Supply and demand forces coexist, but demand deficiencies dominate in the short run. Quarter-on-quarter producer price inflation is predicted to...

We document three new empirical facts: (i) monetary policy shocks increase the markup dispersion across firms, (ii) they increase the relative markup of firms with stickier prices, and (iii) firms with stickier prices have higher markups. This is consis- tent with a New Keynesian model in which...

Manufacturers frequently pay fees to supermarkets when they temporarily reduce prices of their products. These funds are used by supermarkets to cover the costs of promotional campaigns and to compensate reductions in markups during promotions. Anecdotal evidence suggests that these fees are...

How should firms optimally choose prices and promotional strategies and how should they position their products when consumers are "relative thinkers"? We provide answers in a model that extends the seminal contributions of Varian (1980) and Narasimhan (1988) and derive both managerial...

In many (online) markets, consumers can readily observe prices, but need to examine individual products at positive cost in order to assess how well they match their needs. We propose a tractable model of price-directed sequential search in a market where firms compete in prices. Each product...

This paper develops a framework for investigating dynamic competition in markets where price is negotiated between an individual customer and multiple firms repeatedly. Using contractlevel data for the Canadian mortgage market, we provide evidence of an "invest-then-harvest" pricing pattern:...

Economic theory provides ambiguous and conflicting predictions about the association between algorithmic pricing and competition. In this paper we provide the first empirical analysis of this relationship. We study Germany’s retail gasoline market where algorithmic-pricing software became...

A modern effective business model involves the use of an appropriate pricing strategy. However, what matters is not only short-term profitability but also the long-term loyalty of clients. The main purpose of this paper is to present a specific transactional pricing strategy for a second-hand...

Recent empirical studies suggest that there is a rising trend of market power across sectors in advanced economies. We contribute to this line of research by providing industry-specific evidence for German manufacturing industries, based on representative high-quality firm level data from...

In online commerce, obfuscation strategies by sellers are hypothesized to mislead consumers to their detriment and to the profit of sellers. One such obfuscation strategy is partitioned pricing in which the price is split into a base price and add-on fees. While empirical evidence suggests that...

Do firms seek to make the market transparent,or do they confuse the consumers in their product perceptions? We show that the answer to this question depends decisively on preference heterogeneity. Contrary to the well-studied case of homogeneous goods, confusion is not necessarily an equilibrium...

The paper discusses the economic aspects of the most important questions (such as demand response or capacity allocation) related to differential pricing. First, we consider a revenue-neutral introduction of peak-load pricing. We examine under what circumstances does peak-load pricing lead to a...

We empirically test the hypothesis that the discounts offered by firms to consumers who purchase tickets in advance increase with the intensity of competition. We develop a new measure of competition for which we use the proximity (in departure time) of a given flight to its competitors to infer...

We study a model of behavior-based price discrimination where firms can agree to share customer information that can be used for personalized pricing. We show that firms are better off sharing customer information as it softens up-front competition when they gather information, consumers are...

The parameterisation of energy and climate policies often depends on the technology, which is price-setting in electricity markets. We propose two simple approaches to determine marginal technologies in electricity wholesale from available data. Both approaches are complementary, computationally...