We develop an organizational governance model with a single buyer and endogenous upstream entry. Investments and control rights over assets and actions are immediately contractable; production is contractable after uncertainty resolves. We show the following: Supplier competition eliminates...

Does "full vertical alignment" - political congruence across national, state, and local tiers - drive economic development? Using a sharp regression discontinuity design based on close state elections in India, we estimate the causal effects of multilevel alignment on growth, inequality, and...

This paper develops a game-theoretic model to study how exclusionary contracts affect firms' incentives to invest in innovation. Several symmetric sellers compete to supply an identical product to a set of buyers, and each seller can invest in R&D to develop a higher-quality version of the...

We study information design in a vertically differentiated market. A third party publicly discloses information about the product qualities of two competing firms. More precise information improves consumer matching but increases perceived differentiation, enabling firms to raise prices....

This paper extends the CES model of monopolistic competition to the case where varieties are both horizontally and vertically differentiated. A distinctive feature of our model is the presence of a network externality, which operates through the number of varieties available at each quality...

This paper extends the CES model of monopolistic competition to the case where varieties are both horizontally and vertically differentiated. A distinctive feature of our model is the presence of a network externality, which operates through the number of varieties available at each quality...

The level of government support significantly influences the performance of European railways. However, prior analyses have largely focused on the sector as a whole, neglecting the distribution of public budget contributions between the upstream infrastructure manager and downstream service...

This paper examines vertical skills mismatch in Türkiye using a refined measure that adjusts for occupation, age group, sector, and year to isolate genuine education-job misalignment from compositional artifacts. Drawing on nationally representative labor force survey microdata from 2009 to...

Sellers face a critical choice: run competitive auctions or strike exclusive deals with preferred buyers. Contrary to conventional wisdom that sellers should rely on open competition, we show that a powerful seller optimally commits to a sequential `flexclusivity' arrangement - a strategic mix...

We study two first‐order economic consequences of vertical mismatch, using a simple (neoclassical) model of under and overemployment. Individuals of high type can perform both skilled and unskilled jobs, but only a fraction of low‐type workers can perform skilled jobs. People have different...

This paper proposes a simple yet useful framework for evaluating vertical mergers in digital markets by distinguishing between product-specific and ecosystem-specific network effects. Vis-'a-vis no network effects, product-specific network effects amplify foreclosure and steering incentives, as...

This study assesses whether vertically integrated rail undertakings (VIUs) across EU Member States comply with the principles of transparency, non-discrimination, and fair competition as outlined in Directive 2012/34/EU and its amendments. VIUs refer to corporate structures where a single entity...

The level of government support significantly influences the performance of European railways. However, prior analyses have largely focused on the sector as a whole, neglecting the distribution of public budget contributions between the upstream infrastructure manager and downstream service...

This study examines the impact of vertical interlock on corporate tax avoidance in business groups using data on Chinese listed companies from 2003 to 2019. We find that vertical interlock has a negative impact on corporate tax avoidance. Our result is robust to alternative measures,...

This article examines the price effects of gasoline stations following a retail merger in 2022. Using detailed station-level price data from 2020 to 2024, the analysis shows that fuel prices increase at both merging stations and their competitors, but with regional differences. These regional...

In this paper, we study supplier encroachment in competition with multi-product retailers and its effects on retail profits under endogenous consumer shopping behavior. We find that supplier encroachment (weakly) increases both supplier and retailer profits, as the retailer benefits from better...

Widespread market imperfections in agricultural value chains raise the possibility that regulatory interventions may enhance efficiency and farmers' welfare. We develop a structural model of agricultural value chains and estimate it using rich data from Costa Rica's coffee sector to evaluate...