The Life Cycle of the U.S. Tire Industry

We introduce a new theory of industry evolution. According to our model, the nonmonotonicity in firm numbers found in many young industries is a consequence of the gradual decline in unit costs. Early stages of the industry life cycle, when unit costs and profit margins are high, display positive net entry rates. In later stages, declining unit costs and increasing competition limit the market room for (fringe) firms accumulating in a shakeout. The model explains paths of output, price level, and firm numbers using a recursive system of equations. We apply the model to the U.S. tire industry.     

An Equilibrium Selection Theory of Monopolization

We develop a duopoly model in which firms compete for the market (e.g., investing in process innovation or product development) as well as in the market (e.g., setting quantities or prices). Competition for the market generates multiple equilibria that differ in the firms’ investment levels, relative size, and profitability. We show that monopolization that affects competition in the market can act as an equilibrium selection device in competition for the market. In particular, it eliminates equilibria that are undesirable for the monopolizing firm, while not generating new equilibria. This result complicates the task of determining whether a firm's dominance in a given market is the result of fair competition or unlawful monopolization. We discuss a number of implications for antitrust policy and litigation, and illustrate these by means of two well‐known antitrust cases.     

The impossibility of underemployment with more than one product market

We investigate the link between 'underemployment at all wages'and income feedback effects due to firms' activities in an economywith imperfect competition in the product markets. The sizeof income feedback effects negatively depends on the numberof product markets. We strengthen a previous result demonstratedin an overlapping generations model with inelastic price expectations:underemployment at all wages may only exist when the economycontains a single product market, i.e., when firms integrateall feedback effects in their programs.     

Local Content Requirements, Vertical Cooperation, and Foreign Direct Investment

Local content requirements (LCRs) have been observed empirically to 1) protect vertically integrated domestic industries and 2) induce inward foreign direct investment (FDI) in intermediate goods production. We examine the effects of an LCR in the context of potential FDI in upstream manufacturing by a foreign multinational and potential vertical cooperation between a host country's upstream and downstream producers. In case of vertical cooperation domestic producers have an incentive to set the price of the intermediate strategically to discourage FDI. Vertical cooperation is found to enhance the rent-shifting effect of the LCR, whereas the FDI response increases price competition and reduces domestic profits. In both cases, manufacturing efficiency and foreign welfare decrease, suggesting the need for multilateral agreement in the WTO to curb the continuing but disguised use of LCRs in industrialized countries.     

质量的产能约束、信息不对称与大销量倾向:以食品安全为例

食品安全关系到每一个人的健康与生存,但以乳品为代表的食品类企业却往往忽视质量控制而热衷于销量扩张.本文从技术约束和信息不对称的角度对此给出了一种解释.分析表明:竞争压力未必是解释该现象的关键因素;只要产品的市场容量较大、并且在投资不足的前提下提供优质产品的产能相对较小,即使没有竞争的压力,厂商在质量控制上的投资也不充分,而且总是热衷于低价大销量的营销方式,后者被消费者视为投资充分的不完美信号.增强监管无法从根本上改变厂商投资不足且追逐大销量的现状,但能增加厂商高投资的可能性、提高产品的平均质量.我们的结论在一定程度上吻合乳品等国内食品企业高速扩张但忽视质量控制的现状.     

供需视角下入境旅游与星级酒店系统耦合协调发展研究——以海南省为例

海南岛是国际旅游岛,旅游业是海南四大主导产业之一。星级酒店和入境旅游在海南旅游业发展中占重要地位。采用海南省2000—2020年入境旅游与星级酒店相关数据,基于供需视角构建海南省入境旅游需求系统与星级酒店供给系统耦合评价指标体系与系统耦合模型,分析两个系统综合评价指数发展和耦合协调度。结果表明：2000—2005年海南省入境旅游发展落后于星级酒店,入境旅游与星级酒店处于濒临失调和轻度失调级别,供给大于需求;随着入境旅游发展和星级酒店调整,两者的耦合协调度逐渐增加,2006—2020年两系统主要处于初级协调等级;海南省入境旅游与星级酒店耦合协调度整体上耦合程度逐渐提高,保持入境旅游与星级酒店供需平衡是实现二者高度耦合协调的关键。     

Retail margins, price transmission and price asymmetry in urban food markets: the case of Kinshasa (Zaire)

Some African food markets can still seem to operate inefficientlyafter price liberalisation. This seems mainly due to the existenceof significant transaction costs because of small-scale operations,and is influenced by lack of grading, deficient infrastructureand information systems. It is shown in the case of retail marketsin Kinshasa that search, supervision and other difficult-to-measuretransactions costs are more important in the margin of foodproducts than the measurable marketing costs (e.g., storage,transport). It is also shown through time series analysis thatmost of the price transmission between wholesale and retailhappens in the same week and that price asymmetry, i.e., thedifferent transmission of price increases compared with pricedecreases, is present for most products. Products characterisedby relatively more standardisation and homogeneity are shownto have lower retail margins and to behave symmetrically. Amodel based on kinked demand curves and search costs might explainthis asymmetric price behaviour.     

The effectiveness of supply-side tax cuts under alternative political models

Conclusion Unless a supply-side tax cut is accompanied by a genuine limit on government spending, there are two relative price effects that need to be taken into consideration. The case for a supply-side tax cut has been based on the relative price shift between consumption versus investment goods. However, investment incentives created by this change in relative prices may be completely stymied by the political response to an accompanying relative price shift between publicly and privately supplied goods. It is the conclusion of this paper that the latter relative price effect will be more important in a political process controlled by the median voter than in one controlled by special interests.Based on the conclusion, it is interesting to speculate that those who model government as responsive to the median voter, [e.g., Meltzer and Richard (1981)] will be less enthusiastic about supply-side tax cuts not accompanied by spending limits than those who model government as controlled by special interests [e.g., Niskanen (1971)]. Another, and possibly safer, conjecture is to reverse directions and conclude that enthusiastic supply-siders will be those who believe that government size is largely determined by the demands of special interests and as a consequence is excessive.     

Bertrand-Edgeworth equilibrium in a cash-in-advance economy

This paper is about price and wage competition in a dynamicgeneral equilibrium model. We consider an equity financed economywhere firms need money to finance their input costs. Part ofthe output is sold for money to be used in the next period asworking capital and the remaining part is distributed to ownersas real dividends. We first characterize the steady state competitiveequilibrium path. Second, we study whether this competitiveequilibrium can be supported as a pure strategy Nash equilibriumin price and wage setting games. We prove a positive resultfor price competition and a negative one for wage competition.     

Diagrammatic Approach to Capacity-Constrained Price Discrimination

This paper presents a diagrammatic solution to the firm's profit-maximizing price discrimination problem in the face of capacity constraints. Airlines, hotels, and other firms practice yield management, allocating fixed capacity to customer groups paying different prices. In these cases, the firm's short-run problem is not a decision about production levels, but it is one of allocating a fixed number of output units among customers. Our diagram shows that the conditions for profit-maximizing price discrimination are very different under these circumstances than in the standard model in which the firm is not constrained by capacity.     

Regulation, competition, and the structure of prices

Many competition policy issues in regulated industries concernthe structure of prices charged by multi-product firms - forexample price discrimination, non-linear pricing, cross-subsidies,and network access pricing. This article first sets out the(Ramsey) principles of optimal pricing to recover fixed costs.The sometimes conflicting aims of promoting competition andpursuing social objectives are brought into the analysis. Questionsof whether to allow pricing structure discretion to the firm,and how much, are considered next. With asymmetric information,some discretion is often desirable, but its optimal form ishard to characterize. The article then turns to the controversialnetwork access pricing problem - on what terms should an integrateddominant firm be required to supply inputs required by its rivals?Finally, there is discussion of pricing structure regulationin the transition from more to less regulation, which, it isto be hoped, is in prospect in parts of the regulated industriesas effective competition develops.     

我国酒店企业文化与本土文化的融合与创新

酒店企业最终意义上的竞争是酒店文化之间的竞争,酒店如何成功的实施文化战略关系着其持续的发展。文章对酒店企业实施文化战略的必要性进行了分析,并考察了优秀酒店企业文化的特色,然后结合云南省丽江地区酒店企业的实际情况,探讨我国酒店企业如何实现酒店文化与本土文化的融     

Competition,asset build up and export incentives: The role of imperfect credit market

This paper studies the export incentive of credit rationed, competitive and homogenous firms through asset build up highlighting the generic trade-off between competition and asset value in an imperfect credit market where poor and rich firms have different levels of assets. It is a contribution to the issues related to finance and trade in developing countries as raised first in Jones and Marjit (2001, AER). Our theoretical and empirical results indicate that although firms in more competitive industries are likely to be exporters, history of greater local competition before the entry of firms into export market i.e. under autarky, hurts export incentive by limiting cash flows and asset build up. In our set up more intense local competition hence lower price is an advantage to access global markets, but associated low profits and hence lower assets acts a detriment.     

Chamberlin without differentiation: Soft capacity constrained price competition with free entry

We show that the long-term properties of price and cost in Chamberlin's monopolistic competition model can be reproduced with a soft capacity constrained price competition oligopoly model for a homogeneous good with free entry.     

The asymmetric effects of oil price changes on China’s exports: New evidence from a nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model

China’s dependence on oil imports has greatly increased in recent years. Due to the rapid expansion of global trade, exporting plays an important role in the Chinese economy. This paper uses monthly data from January 2005 to April 2021 to examine the short- and long-term effects of oil price increases and decreases on China’s exports. Our empirical analyses are based on the nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) model, which can effectively capture asymmetric relations. The empirical results provide significant evidence of asymmetry, such that oil price increases have significantly larger effects than oil price decreases in the long term. Interestingly, we find that energy-intensive exports and some specific sectors (e.g., crude fertilizers, petroleum products, and organic chemicals) benefit from oil price increases. We also observe recent declines in the coal and coke sector following positive oil price shocks due to restrictions on coal consumption.     

What affects intranational price dispersion?: The case of Japanese gasoline prices

The empirical analysis on price dispersion, as described by [Engel, C., Rogers, J.H., 1996. How wide is the Border? American Economic Review 86, 1112–1125], is to investigate the determinants of international relative price fluctuations. Using data from the Japanese gasoline industry, we investigate the implications of the market structure for intranational price dispersion. Our empirical results suggest that: (1) in conformity with the double marginalization model, the dispersion of the wholesale gasoline price is affected by the relative retailer’s margin and (2) the dispersion of the retail gasoline margin is influenced by the degree of competition and advertising. Considering these results synthetically, the retail price dispersion is amplified by the retail market structure both directly and indirectly.     

Pricing to market, firm heterogeneity and the role of quality

We build a pricing-to-market (PTM) model with firm heterogeneity, which allows for imperfect competition and market segmentation in the presence of flexible exchange rates, horizontal and vertical differentiation and different tastes of consumers in destination markets. We derive firm’s pricing behaviour in response to price and quality competition shocks. We show that there is PTM heterogeneity across firms if quality has a role. We empirically assess the main predictions of our theoretical framework on Italian firm-level data. We document that export-domestic price margins are significantly affected by price and quality competitiveness factors even controlling for foreign demand conditions, size, export intensity, destination markets and unobservables. Finally, we provide evidence of strong heterogeneity across firms in their reaction to price and quality competitiveness.     

生产性服务业的影响因素研究——基于我国东部沿海地区地级市的实证分析

研究生产性服务业的影响因素,有助于把握生产性服务业发展的关键,为政策制定提供理论基础。在选取金融业等八个行业作为生产性服务业的基础上,将生产性服务业的影响因素归结为经济发展水平、经济发展结构、经济外向性程度、城市化水平、资本积累、人力资本积累等六个方面,采用了传统计量经济学和空间计量经济学的方法对截面数据进行了回归分析。通过基于我国东部沿海地区地级市的实证研究发现,经济发展水平、人力资本积累、经济发展结构、城市化水平较为显著,其他因素并不显著。同时证实了我国东部沿海地区的生产性服务业在空间上具有显著的空间集聚特征,此时的空间回归模型要优于传统计量回归模型。     

石油国内税的价格效应——基于垂直市场结构的研究

石油进口国的国内税政策不仅影响消费者价格,还通过垂直市场结构传导影响石油公司买卖价差和国际石油价格。本文发现,在生产与贸易中介环节的不同市场结构组合下,石油国内税的价格效应明显不同。如果石油公司间竞争不强,国内税价格传递弹性为负,国际价格下降而石油公司要价上升;如果石油公司间竞争很强,国内税价格传递弹性为正,国际价格和石油公司要价同向下降。结合美国、欧盟和日本的需求弹性特征,实证结果支持了本文的理论分析结果,也为美国、欧盟和日本实际国内税率与最优税率的偏离提供了证据。     

消费激励对厂商定价选址行为的影响

企业的消费激励策略构成产品的差异特征,通过改变消费者的需求来影响企业的定价方式和定位。文章利用Hotelling两阶段博弈模型,在考虑运输成本基础上,进一步引入消费激励,来分析两个竞争销售企业在消费激励条件下选址定价问题。消费激励使得价格上升,减弱了企业间的价格竞争,也使得企业扩大空间差异的经济效果显著,企业在空间上有集聚的趋势。