价格歧视、经销商串货与反垄断分析——以"诺基亚事件"为例

实施歧视性定价策略是生产商在面对具有不同价格弹性的市场需求时获取最大化利润的常用手段。价格歧视压缩了经销商获利空间,侵蚀了消费者剩余,可能引致经销商之间的串货行为,进而引发生产商和经销商之间的纠纷。价格歧视和经销商串货都属于策略性商业行为,可能改变剩余分配状况和社会福利水平,限制公平竞争,扰乱市场秩序。本文首先分析价格歧视和经销商串货的主要动因、发生机制和福利效应,然后以诺基亚手机串货事件为例,结合反垄断法的相关条文,对价格歧视、串货和反串货行为进行反垄断分析。     

价格歧视违法性的认定规则研究

经济生活中的价格歧视是一种定价策略,只有其产生排除、限制竞争的社会效应时政府才能依法规制。价格歧视的反竞争效应是判定价格歧视违法性的基点。纵向市场与横向市场中价格歧视存在的形态对价格歧视违法性的认定有较大影响,应区别适用违法性认定标准。     

浅谈反垄断中的价格歧视问题

滥用支配地位的行为类型有很多,价格歧视就是其中之一,传统反垄断法对该行为是持有严厉的态度。如果支配企业从事价格歧视,就必然会产生排斥竞争的效果,甚至还有一些滥用行为出现,这些行为均是反垄断法所禁止的。审查反垄断行为时,要以价格歧视的构成要件作为基础来对其定性。这些行为之后再对该行为的竞争产生的厉害关系进行分析,在这一基础上来判断是否该禁止。价格歧视问题的存在不单是相关立法不完善,也从另一侧面反映出我国在反垄断执法过程中存在一些问题。反垄断法的出现正是保证充分竞争的前提。所以,我国在反垄断领域应该积极采取应对措施以适应社会经济的发展。文章从价格歧视行为的概念及基本的分析步骤入手,针对价格歧视对相关市场界定的影响及构成价格歧视行为的主要因素进行了详细分析,并提出了反垄断执法给我国的启示,为今后的研究提供一些有力依据。     

基于数字正义视角的福利损益算法议价及向善治理研究

企业借助算法技术挖掘消费者信息数据，提高产品议价能力，结合自由推进市场实现利益最大化，但这并不代表消费者剩余也会下降。转换成本需要借助优势算法形成技术壁垒，进而锁定消费者，强化企业初期竞争。针对互联网平台价格歧视行为，由于福利效应的不确定性以及执法程序尚未明确，因此，从数字正义视角分析福利损益算法议价及向善治理，通过分析大数据价格歧视、企业定价以及社会福利效应，基于数字正义视角作为基础，研究治理问题。通过向善治理数字经济的提出，确保大数据经济时代的公平性、公正性，符合道德伦理可持续发展的要求。     

欧美禁止滥用市场支配地位问题研究

美国和欧盟作为反垄断立法发达的国家对滥用市场支配地位行为的规制有了较为成熟的经验。主要体现在对支配地位的界定、对滥用行为构成要素的分析和对超高定价、掠夺定价、价格歧视、搭售、拒绝交易等行为的具体认定上。借鉴国外成功经验,并结合中国特有国情,对我国反垄断立法和实践具有重大意义。     

数字经济反垄断中消费者福利标准的反思与适用

数字经济背景下消费者福利损害范围的规模性和不特定性、损害方式的个性化、损害结果的难以计量性要求反垄断法介入保护,数字经济非价格因素和动态竞争的特征使得传统消费者福利标准适用失灵,而实践中消费者福利标准往往会成为案件分析中的修饰性表达,导致反垄断法规范目标偏移。数字经济高度集中化的趋势,要求消费者福利保护由重视经济效率向重视市场结构和竞争过程转变,反垄断法作为行为规制法对消费者福利进行保护,防止消费者福利庸俗化。为避免科技巨头经济垄断权力蔓延至政治中心,新布兰代斯学派反对以消费者福利作为唯一诉求,主张通过反垄断法分析范式转型保障消费者选择权,实现经济民主和反垄断法多元目标。消费者福利保护是反垄断法的间接目标,应被作为判断竞争损害的参考要素。对于数字经济反垄断中消费者选择权损害的分析,应遵循合理原则,综合权衡经营者行为的竞争损害效果和消费者福利增进效果。同时,从实体标准和程序制度层面细化和完善消费者福利标准在垄断协议、滥用市场支配地位和经营者集中行为规制中的具体适用。     

对超高定价行为的反垄断规制——基于典型案例的分析

超高定价是反垄断法中最具争议的议题之一.对美、欧、韩、中的几起典型案例分析发现,对超高定价行为的反垄断规制存在着两种截然不同的模式,即竞争状态下的“自由放任”模式和不利消费者情形下的“规制”模式,两者各有其合理性.中国秉承消费者福利优先理念,基于本身竞争文化、市场环境等因素考量,选择“规制”模式,值得肯定.但需要注意的是,为了避免破坏市场价格机制、造成执法错误,对超高定价的反垄断规制必须采取审慎态度,即在充分论证市场存在较高进入障碍、经营者具有市场支配地位及行业监管不力的前提下进行.同时,可通过优先选择性适用经营者承诺制度、优化超高定价行为的认定方法及加强与行业协会监管部门的合作等措施,以提高执法效率.     

二、三级价格歧视的定价方式与效应分析

二级价格歧视可采用分段定价方式，构造收益函数，求出利润最大化分割点，确定相应价格；三级价格歧视依据MR1=MR2=MC的原则定价。笔者认为，实施价格歧视可以根据需求价格弹性区别定价，有利于增加生产者剩余和消费者剩余，从而增加社会福利．     

努力提高企业竞争法律意识 严格规制联合限制竞争行为 对外经贸大学法学院黄勇教授专访

规制联合限制竞争行为专题联合限制竞争行为,又称垄断协议或卡特尔,是指经营者之间达成的旨在排除、限制竞争或有此种效果的协议或协同行为。根据不同类型的联合限制竞争行为对社会福利和资源配置效率以及社会稳定所造成的不同影响,各国反垄断当局对联合限制竞争行为的处理采取不同的原则。一是“本身违法原则”,也称“当然违法原则”,即某些行为本身已被依法确定为违法,凡发生这些行为就认定其违法,而不再根据具体情况进行分析判断,也不接受当事人的任何抗辩。二是“合理原则”,是指对某些行为是否在实质上构成限制竞争,并在法律上予以禁止不是一概而论,需要对企业的动机、行为方式及其后果加以慎重考察后做出判断并予以认定。本期话题通过对黄勇教授的专访、毛晓飞博士对浙江宁海县煤气公司等限制竞争案的评析和浙江、重庆工商行政执法机关对相关市场联合限制竞争行为进行规制的执法实践介绍,希望引起读者对联合限制竞争行为的关注。     

价格卡特尔的认定和规制

价格卡特尔由于限制竞争,从而"本身违法".本文指出,价格卡特尔侵犯的客体是公平自由的竞争秩序;客观方面表现为经营者之间的共谋及协同一致的行为;行为主体是参与价格卡特尔的经营者;主观方面表现为故意并且具有限制竞争的合意.掌握价格卡特尔行为的构成要件对于认定价格卡特尔具有极大的现实意义.     

Balancing Profitability and Customer Welfare in a Supermarket Chain

We investigate the impact of price discrimination by a large Chicago supermarket chain. First we measure the impact of the chain's current zone-pricing policy on shelf prices, variable profits and consumer welfare across its stores. Using the chain's database to simulate a finer store-specific micro-pricing policy, we study the implications of this policy on profits and welfare. We show how a store-pricing policy that is constrained to offer consumers at least as much surplus as a uniform chain wide pricing policy still enables the retailer to generate substantial incremental profits.To ensure our pricing problem exhibits a well-defined optimum, we use the parsimonious, mixed-logit demand function that allows for flexible substitution patterns across brands and also retains a link to consumer theory. We discuss the issue of price endogeneity when estimating the demand parameters with weekly store-level data. Standard instrumental variables techniques used to account for such endogeneity also seem to increase the magnitudes of own-price elasticities thereby offsetting the problem encountered by previous researchers of predicted prices from a demand model exceeding those in the actual data.     

Online Price Discrimination and EU Data Privacy Law

Online shops could offer each website customer a different price. Such personalized pricing can lead to advanced forms of price discrimination based on individual characteristics of consumers, which may be provided, obtained, or assumed. An online shop can recognize customers, for instance through cookies, and categorize them as price-sensitive or price-insensitive. Subsequently, it can charge (presumed) price-insensitive people higher prices. This paper explores personalized pricing from a legal and an economic perspective. From an economic perspective, there are valid arguments in favour of price discrimination, but its effect on total consumer welfare is ambiguous. Irrespectively, many people regard personalized pricing as unfair or manipulative. The paper analyses how this dislike of personalized pricing may be linked to economic analysis and to other norms or values. Next, the paper examines whether European data protection law applies to personalized pricing. Data protection law applies if personal data are processed, and this paper argues that that is generally the case when prices are personalized. Data protection law requires companies to be transparent about the purpose of personal data processing, which implies that they must inform customers if they personalize prices. Subsequently, consumers have to give consent. If enforced, data protection law could thereby play a significant role in mitigating any adverse effects of personalized pricing. It could help to unearth how prevalent personalized pricing is and how people respond to transparency about it.     

The market value for product attribute improvements under price personalization

Personalization of the marketing mix is a topic of much interest to marketing academics and practitioners. Using discrete choice demand theory, we investigate the aggregate market value for product attribute improvements when firms are engaged in personalized pricing. Our results provide a theoretically grounded rule for how to aggregate consumer valuations to assess the overall profitability of attribute improvements under price personalization. Under common pricing, each consumer contributes the same margin. Profitability of an attribute improvement is thus driven by inducing more consumers to buy. Consumers with high choice probabilities are given less weight in the market valuation under common pricing as they are less responsive to attribute improvements. Under personalized pricing, profitability of an attribute improvement is driven by extraction of consumer surplus from high valuation consumers. Consumers with higher valuations, and consequently higher choice probabilities, are given more weight in the market valuation under personalized pricing. Since individual consumers play a more central role in the market valuation under personalized pricing, estimation of consumer-level valuations is of increased importance. Under common pricing, the market valuation for an attribute improvement is robust to extreme estimates of the consumer-level valuations. Through our theoretical and empirical analyses, we demonstrate that this robustness does not hold under personalized pricing.     

Monopoly Pricing of Social Goods

We analyse the roles of network connectivity and topology on the monopoly pricing of network goods which enable social interaction between consumers. Connectivity between network members induces the well-known network externalities effect, while the topological effect is caused by the incompleteness of the social network’s linkage, and it has not been previously recognised in this context. We find that the topological effect counteracts, and dominates, the connectivity effect by reducing the monopoly’s capacity to extract consumer surplus. Our results are seen to hold in real cases of social network businesses. The monopolist benefits from price discrimination based on consumers’ social connections, but this has a social cost as consumer surplus loss is higher than the increase in profits, with the highly connected consumers being the primary losers. Therefore, privacy policies restricting excessive social profiling and tracking can have an antitrust role too. Our approach also extends the theory of multi-sided markets in relation to the underlying relations graph of different market sides.     

Third-Degree Price Discrimination in the Presence of Asymmetric Consumption Externalities

In this paper, we consider third-degree price discrimination in two markets in the presence of asymmetric consumption externalities; we establish that under plausible conditions, a firm reduces its price in the market with low price elasticity of demand. The firm can increase its profits by reducing the price for these consumers and enlarging the demand for other consumers, provided that positive consumption externalities exist. Moreover, we show that third-degree price discrimination enhances not only the firm’s profit but also total consumer surplus.

Unequal Pricing in the Information Economy: Implications for Consumer Welfare

This article presents an economic analysis of information good pricing and consumer welfare, and discusses the implications of price discrimination in the information economy. It argues that network externalities, coupled with information asymmetry, enable a dominant marketer to price unequally, extracting late adopters surplus to compensate for the loss from early adopters. In the short term, the minority early adopters benefit by paying less, but in the long term, the majority late adopters suffer by paying more. Considering that late adopters are likely to be at a disadvantage in resources, this discriminatory pricing amounts to the poor subsidizing the rich. Based on this analysis, implications for consumer welfare are discussed.     

Seller honesty and product line pricing

We study upselling in markets where the seller observes consumer need but the consumer herself may not (e.g., medical care, durable repairs, financial and legal services). The seller may recommend excessive product features to uninformed consumers. In a monopoly with two types of consumer (one with a basic need and the other an advanced need) and two types of service (a basic service which fulfills only the basic need and an advanced service which fulfills both needs), we investigate the firm’s honesty and product-line pricing. We reach several results. First, the firm is honest if the basic service is superior (in that it generates higher per-capita social surplus than the advanced service under the efficient allocation) or if the consumers with the basic need are sufficiently many. Second, when there exist informed consumers who neglect seller recommendation, the presence of informed consumers may cause consumer welfare to decrease, and a larger informed population may cause firm profits and social welfare to increase or decrease. Lastly, when the informed consumers boycott a dishonest firm and withhold purchase, firm profits may increase because the threat of boycotting makes the firm more credible and allows a higher price of the advanced service.     

Impact of personalization and privacy concerns on information disclosure and pricing

Advances in IT have enabled some firms to offer personalized products according to the private information disclosed by consumers, while others are still offering standardized products, which brings about asymmetric competition. For consumers, disclosing private information for personalized products leads to reduced misfit cost as well as privacy loss. To illuminate the impact of consumers' trade-off between the benefit of information disclosure and the associated privacy concerns on firms' asymmetric price competition, we consider a setting where only one firm is capable of product personalization based on consumers' personal information. The capable firm makes a profit from selling the product and monetizing consumers' information. We demonstrate that as the capable firm becomes more adept at personalization, he may raise or lower the price depending on his profit foci, and an improvement in his capability does not always guarantee a higher profit. Counterintuitively, an increase in the unit misfit cost (i.e., greater product differentiation) can, under certain circumstances, intensity price competition, making both firms worse off and leading to higher consumer surplus. We also show that when consumers are more privacy-concerned, there exists an indirect effect that weakens the impact of an increase in price on the monetization of consumers’ information, and hence price competition can be mitigated and both firms can be better off. Furthermore, we demonstrate that product personalization with misfit-reducing effect always increases consumer surplus under the asymmetric competition. Our findings provide firms and policy-makers with great managerial insights.     

Consumers' Interpretations of the Semantic Phrases Found in Reference Price Advertisements

Consumers are frequently presented with a higher reference price to compare with a lower advertised selling price. The research on reference prices has traditionally been conducted based on the implicit assumption that consumers’ interpretations of a given semantic phrase, e.g., “Regular Price/Sale Price,”are consistent across all consumers, but this fundamental assumption has never been tested. Guidelines issued by the Federal Trade Commission and the Council of Better Business Bureaus, as well as regulations enacted by approximately half of all states, appear to be based on a similar assumption. However, given the variability among consumers’ perceptions found in other areas of consumer research, it is reasonable to expect that consumer interpretations of semantic phrases may vary. Given the potential variability, a pricing claim may be deemed informative or deceptive depending on the meaning the particular consumer attaches to the claim. This article presents a discussion of the vagueness in pricing claims as a step toward evaluating deception.     

Horizontal mergers under uniform resource constraints

Resource constraints have a vertical influence on a firm's competition and it is important to address the issue of horizontal mergers with scarce resources. This article highlights the effects of uniform resource constraints on horizontal mergers with game theory methods. First, the threshold values for the firms to accept the merger, increasing consumer surplus, and increasing social welfare are presented and compared. Second, the threshold value to merge for consumer surplus maximization is larger than that for profit incentive mergers without resource constraints. Thus, under unbinding resource industries, mergers reduce consumer surplus and it is necessary to implement antitrust. Third, resource constraints deter mergers. Finally, under binding capacity (or resource) constraints, the threshold value for firms to merge is larger than that for the social optimality. Therefore, industries with scare resource should avoid antitrust.