The Effect of Quotas on Domestic Product Price and Quality

A quota on foreign competition generally leads to quality upgrading (downgrading) of the low-quality (high-quality) firm, an increase in average quality, a reduction of quality differentiation, and a reduction of domestic consumer surplus, irrespective of whether the foreign firm produces higher or lower quality. Effects of a quota on industry profits and domestic welfare depend on the direction of international vertical differentiation. If the foreign firm produces low quality, both firms prices and profits rise but domestic welfare falls. This describes well some major effects of a Japanese Voluntary Export Restraint (VER) in the U.S. auto market and relevant empirical findings. If the foreign firm produces high quality, foreign profits will fall. Since domestic consumer surplus falls only unsubstantially, domestic profit gains lead to an increase of domestic welfare.I am grateful to Jim Gaisford, and Konrad Stahl, seminar participants at the Universität Mannheim and at the ZEW, and an anonymous referee for useful comments and suggestions. As Senior Fellow at the Center for European Integration Studies (ZEI), Bonn, I gratefully acknowledge its continued support.     

Price Competition Between Teams

This study uses an experimental approach to examine whether markets are sensitive to the internal incentive structure of the competitors. Toward this goal, we modeled the competitors in a price competition duopoly game as three-player teams. Each player simultaneously declares a bid (price) and the team whose total bid was lower won the competition and was paid accordingly. The losing team was paid nothing, and in case of a tie, each team was paid half its price. This duopoly game was studied under two conditions; a cooperative treatment in which the team's profit was divided equally amongst its members and a non-cooperative one in which each individual member was paid her own bid. Whereas the Nash equilibrium is for each player in either treatment to demand the minimal price possible, we predicted that convergence to the competitive price would be much faster in the cooperative treatment than in the non-cooperative one. The experimental results firmly confirmed this prediction.     

以行业自律价来干预降价竞销并不明智

降价竞销是近年总供求关系发生逆转后的正常现象,不应被贬斥为“不正当竞争行为”。靠实施行业自律价来人为阻止降价促销并不明智,也没有经济法规依据,是价格改革的倒退,导致保护落后、阻碍行业技术进步等适得其反的后果。靠行业垄断定价来保证利税收入会得不偿失。降价压库是扩大内需的重要途径。随着扩张性财政货币政策的落实到位,普遍削价热潮将逐渐退温,行业自律价更成多余     

Price,Programming and Potential Competition in US Cable Television Markets

Potential competition in the US cable television industry is empirically examined for 385 markets. Predicted entry probabilities are included in a supply-demand model to permit empirical investigation of the effect of potential competition on incumbent cable operators price and channel programming decisions. Estimation results show incumbents offer more channels to consumers in markets facing greater potential competition from broadband service provider (BSP) wireline overbuilders and/or incumbent local exchange carriers. In particular, when the probability of entry rises to about 42 the average cable system provides six more channels, and price per channel declines from US$ 0.77 to US$ 0.66.JEL Classification: L8, L9, L11We thank Ben Compaine, Shane Greenstein, Anne Hoag, Donald Waldman, Bradley Wimmer, the editor of this journal, an anonymous referee, and participants at the 30th Research Conference on Communication, Information and Internet Policy (TPRC 2002), September 28–30, 2002, Hilton Hotel, Alexandria, Virginia, for comments. Armando Galarraga and Nana Puangpathumanond provided research assistance, and Jane Frenette and Jonathan Levy provided excellent help with FCC cable entry and competition data. The usual disclaimer applies.     

Optimal Tax Policy under Environmental Quality Competition

This paper studies the socially optimal emission and commodity tax policy when consumers are willing to pay a price-premium for environmentally friendlier variants of a commodity vertically differentiated in environmental quality. The first-best levels of quality can be obtained by a combination of a uniform ad valorem tax and an emission tax (or a subsidy for buying green products). The first-best emission tax is higher than the social valuation of the positive externality associated with average environmental quality. Regardless of environmentally conscious consumers, if only one instrument is available, the second-best emission tax is equal to the social valuation of the positive externality associated with average environmental quality. A uniform ad valorem tax increases welfare only if the social valuation of the positive externality associated with average environmental quality is low enough.     

Capacity Choices and Price Competition in Experimental Markets

We report on experimental duopoly markets with heterogeneous goods. In these markets, sellers first choose capacities and then prices. While capacities remain fixed for either five or ten periods, prices have to be chosen in every period. The experiments starts with two sets of exogenously predetermined capacities. Independently of the distribution of capacities is, a unique pure-strategy in prices is subgame perfect. In equilibrium, capacities should correspond to the Cournot prediction. Given capacities, price-setting behavior is in general consistent with the theory. Average capacities converge above the Cournot level. Capacities converge at the industry level but are somewhat dispersed. Sellers rarely manage to cooperate.     

对生产价格规律的新理解

生产价格规律是价值规律的特殊表现形式 ,其存在的关键是利润平均化和平均利润的产生。在市场经济条件下 ,利润平均化和平均利润的产生是受限的。社会不能只考虑资本的要求 ,劳动者的利益也是需要考虑的。垄断和等价交换会限制生产价格规律的存在和作用。这是社会的进步 ,并非是不合理。     

论价格竞争与产业结构调整

近年来我国出现了接连不断的价格竞争,这不仅在企业界引起了阵阵恐慌与激烈的争论,也成为经济学界关注和讨论的重点。笔者认为,我国近年来出现的价格竞争有着深厚的产业结构背景,它是我国产业结构不合理的必然产物,是经济规律、价值规律在经济生活中的自发的强行的实现,只要能将价格竞争控制在一个合理的范围之内,它对我国的产业结构调整将会起到一定的积极作用。一、引起价格竞争的产业结构背景笔者在分析参与价格大战的产品与行业时,发现它们都有一个共同的特点———产业结构不合理,表现为:行业集中度低、规模效益低下、重复化建设严重、…     

转移成本、价格歧视和非对称寡头竞争

通过在Hotelling空间差异模型的基础上结合转移成本构建非对称企业竞争博弈模型.主要研究在非对称情况下,两企业在一致定价与价格歧视下竞争的均衡结果.还对两种不同定价体制下的均衡结果进行了比较,分析价格歧视是否强化竞争.研究发现价格歧视对竞争的效应是不确定的,很大程度受到两企业不对称程度的影响.     

Trade Reform Diagnostics with Many Households, Quotas, and Tariffs

Revenue-neutral trade reform is desirable if revenues are made up from less costly distortions. With a particular computable general-equilibrium model, reforms can be evaluated, but the robustness of conclusions is suspect; they depend on a particular specification and parameterization of the model economy. This paper provides a diagnostic toolkit which permits sensitivity analysis across model specifications and parameterizations, notably allowing for heterogeneous households. Novel elements include emphasis on the concept of compensated marginal cost of funds (MCF) necessary to sensitivity analysis, development of the MCF of quotas, and analysis of the relationship between aggregate MCF and social welfare.     

Endogenous Timing in a Mixed Duopoly: Price Competition

The endogenous order of moves is analyzed in a mixed duopoly for differentiated goods, where firms choose whether to set prices sequentially or simultaneously. It is shown that, in contrast to the private duopoly where firms set prices sequentially, in the mixed duopoly firms choose prices simultaneously. Moreover, the result obtained in the mixed duopoly under price competition differs from the one under quantity competition, since in the latter case decisions are taken sequentially.      

Labour Hoarding, Price Rigidity and the Theory of Imperfect Competition under Uncertain Demand

It is shown that a monopolistic firm under uncertainty may be inclined to keep some of its output unsold when demand is low. This gives rise to changes in conventional results. Under uncertainty, a risk-neutral monopolistic firm produces more than in a deterministic environment and it refuses to sell its total output when demand is low, because the marginal revenue could become negative or lower than the cost of selling the product. Moreover, in this framework, prices are shown to be more rigid downwards than upwards. The model also provides a new explanation for labour hoarding.
JEL classification : D 24; D 42     

Compatibility Standards And Industry Competition: Two Case Studies

Case histories of two data communication interfaces provide evidence of complex strategic behavior in the setting of voluntary compatibility standards. These cases show how subtle differences in the design of standards development organizations affect incentives to cooperate, giving rise to systematic venue preferences. Dominant firms prefer more bureaucratic procedures offering greater protection for the status quo. The two interfaces, FDDI (under development in X3) and DQDB (under development in the IEEE) shed light on competition between the computer and telecommunications industries and the evolution of our communications infrastructure. They demonstrate the importance of standards for intra- and inter-industry competition.     

Bid–Ask Price Competition with Asymmetric Information between Market-Makers

This paper studies the effect of asymmetric information on the price formation process in a quote-driven market. One market-maker receives private information on the value of the quoted asset and repeatedly competes with market-makers who are uninformed. We show that despite the fact that the informed market-maker's quotes are public, the market is never strong-form efficient with certainty until the last stage. We characterize a reputational equilibrium in which the informed market-maker influences and possibly misleads the uninformed market-makers' beliefs. At this equilibrium, a price leadership effect arises, the informed market-maker's expected pay-off is positive and the rate of price discovery increases in the last stages of trade.     

反倾销:有条件地限制价格竞争的规则

本文基于双赢的研究思路，对WTO反倾销规则进行整体而非具体规则的解析，结果发现反倾销具有力图限制进口产品以低价营销的方式对进口成员市场进行过度抢占的功能。其目的是为更多的国家走向贸易自由化提供一种安全性保障，也为一个国家从以自然资源与劳动力廉价为核心的价格竞争优势，向以追求创新为特色的非价格竞争优势转换提供了基于双赢的导向。     

Ambiguous Social Welfare Effects of Price Regulation Under Imperfect Competition

Conventional wisdom is that a binding price ceiling increases output and so increases social welfare if imposed on an imperfectly competitive market. However, this paper shows that a price ceiling can be harmful to social welfare even though it increases industry output and consumer surplus. This model can be applied to the pharmaceutical industry under price control in many countries, e.g., U.K., Canada, Germany and Japan.     

对抗竞争·合作竞争·超越竞争

随着经济发展的不同阶段,企业的竞争也经历了不同的导向阶段。如今,各界对于激烈的对抗竞争已有了比较清晰的看法,提倡企业间采取合作竞争。为实现企业的持久优势,理论界也提出了超越竞争的理论。本文尝试分析从对抗竞争到合作竞争再到超越竞争这一发展主线各个阶段的优劣。     

住房价格、消费与中国货币政策最优选择:基于异质性房价预期的视角

在异质性房价预期和流动性约束条件下,本文构建了包括家庭消费决策、企业生产决策以及中央银行货币政策决策的理论模型。在此基础上,本文采用混合的RBC-VAR方法和1998年1季度至2010年3季度的数据模拟分析了住房价格、消费和货币政策选择之间的关系。结果表明:预期房价上涨的家庭越多,住房价格波动对消费波动的影响越大;贷款价值比越高,住房价格波动对消费波动的放大效应越强,但经验证据并没有支持这种放大效应;盯住住房价格的货币政策获益很少,其在减少产出波动的同时增加了通货膨胀波动。因此,中国人民银行应遏制房价偏离均衡的上涨,尤其是房价上涨预期,但货币政策不宜盯住住房价格。     

竞争政策与跨国最优技术授权策略

本文探讨当前中国在知识产权领域实施(宽松)竞争政策的理论基础。基于本国国有企业和私营企业与具有成本优势的外国企业进行古诺竞争的寡头模型,分析生产型外国企业如何将降低成本的专利技术分别授权给本国的两家企业。我们的研究表明:当不能歧视性授权时,外国企业总是偏好特许权收费方式;当能够歧视性授权时,外国企业在技术创新程度较大时会偏好固定收费方式。由于在歧视性授权下,外国企业将更多的利润转移到母国,因此本国福利在不允许歧视性授权下更高,但全球福利却相反。因此,本国政府从本国福利极大化的角度往往会强化竞争政策,限制歧视性授权;尽管从全球角度看,不限制歧视性授权的宽松竞争政策能够提升全球福利。     

Price or Quantity Competition? Oligopolistic Structures in International Commodity Markets

International commodity markets may be characterized by price or quantity competition and by product differentiation. As an illustration, this paper presents a set of models of the Japanese market for imported beef. The models are evaluated using a non-nested econometric test. The one which best fits the data is a Stackelberg model with price leadership by Australia. This result provides evidence on the explicit nature of the game being played by exporters, unlike the applied conjectural variations approach which provides only an index of how competitive the market is.