Allocative inefficiency properties of price-cap regulation

The paper deals with the argument that a price-cap regulated firm maximizing profits under the price-cap constraint will set prices that over time approach the Ramsey structure. My analysis explores the effects of price caps on the structure of prices. The results are in important aspects at variance with the claim of convergence to a Ramsey structure.     

Setting the X Factor in Price-Cap Regulation Plans

Despite the popularity of price-cap regulation in practice, the economic literature provides limited guidance on how to determine the X factor, which is the rate at which inflation-adjusted output prices must fall under price-cap plans. We review the relevant basic principles, and then determine how to set the X factor: (1) when only a subset of the firm's products are subject to price-cap regulation, and when product-specific costs and productivity cannot be measured; (2) when changes in regulated prices affect the economy-wide inflation rate; and (3) in the presence of such structural changes as strengthened competitive forces.     

Strategic pricing and entry deterrence under price-cap regulation

This paper shows that dynamic price-cap regulation allows the regulated firm to deter entry. Under dynamic price-cap regulation, the allowed prices in each period are an increasing function of the prices set in the previous period. By setting a low price before entry, the regulated firm can commit itself to charge a low price in the event of entry. If this price is sufficiently low with respect to the potential entrant's fixed cost, entry does not occur. Whether the regulated firm prefers to deter or accommodate entry depends on the level of the entry cost for the prospective entrant, on the tightness of the price-cap and on the degree of market power of the competing firms in case of entry.     

Price-cap regulation and market definition

One of the merits claimed for certain types of price-cap regulation is the possible long-run convergence of the prices of multi-product firms to Ramsey prices. Typically such regulated firms define commodities by such devices as dividing the day into discrete periods, customers into age-groups, distances into ranges, and so on. Allowing that such division is endogenous throws doubt on the ability of Laspeyre quantity-based price-caps to encourage an efficient market definition and hence to generate an efficient price structure.     

RAMSEY TAXES MEET PRICE RIGIDITY

‘Ramsey taxes’ are commodity taxes that minimize deadweight loss. Evidence has shown dramatic differences in the extent of price rigidity across goods: while the prices of some goods change frequently, the prices of other goods seldom change. This paper examines Ramsey taxes in the presence of heterogeneous price rigidity. We find that, to minimize deadweight loss, lower (higher) tax rates should be imposed on goods with rigid prices if their relative prices are too high (low) relative to the would‐be situation of no price stickiness. Intuitively, Ramsey taxes remedy the relative price distortion caused by the price rigidity of some goods. We calibrate our model to data from Taiwan and the USA, showing a significant cut in welfare cost if Ramsey rather than uniform taxes are applied.     

Price-cap Regulation of Airports: Single-till Versus Dual-till

Abstact This paper takes up the debate whether price-cap regulation of airports should take the form of single-till or dual-till regulation. The contribution is to model single- and dual-till regulation, evaluate their welfare implications, and compare them to Ramsey charges. We show that single-till regulation dominates dual-till regulation at non-congested airports with regard to welfare maximization. However, none of them provides an airport with incentives to implement Ramsey charges. A Ramsey optimal price-cap regulation, which achieves this goal, is also presented. Thanks to Kay Mitusch, Pio Baake, and Sascha Lukac for very helpful comments.     

Price Regulation for Independent Transmission Companies

This paper considers methods of price structure regulation of electricity transmission in the context of an independent transmission company (TRANSCO). The focus is on two-part tariffs where the variable part would reflect congestion charges (and ancillary services) while the fixed part would reflect capacity costs. The two-part tariffs form a price-cap index, and the firm could rebalance prices, as long as the index satisfies the price-cap constraint. The firm would then have incentives to trade off congestion against capacity expansion in such a way that it becomes profitable to expand, whenever the costs of congestion on average exceed the costs of expansion. However, with chained Laspeyres weights in the price-cap index expansion may be suboptimal. We therefore discuss ways to improve the expansion factor. Implementing the regulatory schemes considered suggests a hybrid approach combining a TRANSCO with an independent system operator (ISO).     

Can price regulation increase cost-efficiency?

This paper examines the possibility that price regulation increases a monopolist's cost-efficiency. When the firm's choice of cost-reducing effort depends on the output supplied, a binding price-cap, by compelling the monopolist to produce more, results in lower costs. On the basis of a two-period asymmetric information model, the paper demonstrates that price regulation increases efficiency when the elasticity of demand is sufficiently low, even assuming very conservative preferences of the regulator and asymmetric information. Moreover, contrary to previous findings and conventional wisdom, we find that a periodical rate base review may increase productive efficiency through the positive effect on future cost-reducing effort, counterbalancing its well known adverse effect on the current level of effort.     

Optimal Pricing and Price-Cap Regulation in the Postal Sector

This paper studies the optimal price structure in the postal sector when worksharing is available (e.g., for collection, sorting and transportation) and when the operator faces a break-even constraint. Users differ in opportunity and cost to engage in worksharing. We determine the optimal worksharing discount and provide sufficient conditions (on demand functions) under which it exceeds the ECPR level. Furthermore, we show that the optimal prices can be implemented through a global price cap imposed on a weighted average of the prices of all products. The appropriate weights are proportional to the market demand (evaluated at optimal prices) of the corresponding products.     

The Effects of Rivalry with Price Regulation of Electric Power Generation

This article examines how rivalry between an electric utility and nonutility generators (NUGs) affects electricity prices, market structure and welfare. If a utility cannot break even financially when outputs are priced at marginal cost, then the Ramsey optimal price paid by a utility purchasing electricity from a NUG should be below avoided cost, in contrast to the requirements of PURPA. The analysis also compares FDC, Residual and Ramsey prices for a utilitys electricity sales. It illustrates how FDC prices may force a utility to exit relatively competitive business markets, eliminating any benefits of economies of scope from serving both business and residential customers.     

The Complete Welfare Effects of Cost Reductions in a Cournot Oligopoly

This paper provides the smallest upper bound or the critical level for a Cournot firm's market share below which its cost reduction reduces welfare. It shows that a firm's cost reduction increases social welfare with nonlinear demand and nonlinear costs if and only if its market share is above the critical level, which is equal to a weighted sum of the other firms' market shares. The paper also reports similar results for technological spill-overs within any given set of firms.     

Welfare Consequences of Tight Price-Cap Regulation

This paper analyses the welfare effects of price-cap regulation of a multi-product monopolist when the price index has fixed weights. A tight cap can result in welfare below the level associated with an unregulated monopoly. This does not occur if the weights are based on lagged quantities and the level of the cap exceeds the previous period's total cost. In a two-period model the welfare problem is alleviated in the second period but first-period performance can be worse if the firm is not myopic.     

Customer ignorance, price-cap regulation, and rent-seeking in mobile roaming

Mobile phone usage when traveling abroad is expensive. Although the network connection switches frequently between available networks, the choice of network is largely independent of wholesale prices. As a consequence, we show that wholesale prices are strategic substitutes. The recent European price-cap regulation forces firms to reduce wholesale and retail roaming prices, but does not solve the underlying problem. There may thus be a permanent need for regulation analogous to what we have for domestic call termination. Furthermore, we show that there is a risk that wholesale price-cap regulation stimulates wasteful rent-seeking activity.     

Dominant Firm Pricing with Competitive Entry and Regulation: The Case of IntraLATA Toll

In this paper, we develop a generalized model of a dominant firm-competitive fringe industry in which products are differentiated, costs vary across suppliers, and the dominant firm is subject to alternative regulatory regimes. The model yields an equilibrium condition that can be tested empirically using data on Bell Operating Companies' pricing of intraLATA toll telephone service. Estimation of a reduced form price equation provides strong support for the theoretical model. Of particular interest, the results suggest that dominant firm (Bell Operating Company) toll prices are driven down by the presence of actual and potential fringe competitors (interexchange carriers) when entry is authorized by the state. Additionally, the results fail to provide evidence that the introduction of incentive regulation or price-cap regulation has reduced intraLATA toll prices.     

Average-cost pricing: Some evidence and implications

We present new survey evidence on pricing behavior for more than 14,000 European firms, and study its macroeconomic implications. Among firms that are price setters, roughly 75% respond that their prices are set as a markup on total costs, a business practice termed “full cost pricing”. Only 25% set prices as markups over variable or marginal costs. Moreover, using industry data for the U.S., we find that the correlation between changes in output prices and changes in variable input prices is significantly lower when fixed costs are likely to be more important.Since our results are similar to the findings in the classic and controversial paper of Hall and Hitch (1939) and subsequent survey evidence, we believe it worth studying the implications of full cost pricing for macroeconomics. We first propose a problem for the firm where full cost pricing can arise as optimizing behavior. We embed this problem, featuring an occasionally binding constraint, into a simple general equilibrium model. We show that when the model is hit by a shock that makes the constraint binding, the response of endogenous variables is amplified significantly more than it would be under the unconstrained regime.     

最优财政和货币政策及其福利效应分析

本文建立了财政和货币政策协作的最优政策模型,并以中国经济为研究对象,以福利效应为最优政策的评估标准,研究了财政和货币政策协作的最优政策机制。分析表明:在Ramsey最优均衡下,财政和货币政策共同作用于通货膨胀和产出目标,以严格通货膨胀为目标的最优货币规则会使得政策的福利损失最小,但货币政策在产出目标、通货膨胀目标以及政策福利损失三者上不能同时兼顾;最优财政规则是趋向缩小收支差,从而趋近于福利损失最小。本文同时使用贝叶斯分析,对中国经济政策2005年第一季度至2009年第二季度的福利效应进行了评估,实证分析表明:样本期间政策的无条件福利损失处于波动状态,经济增长增加了家庭部门的条件福利损失,即经济增长导致跨期消费成本增加。     

Stand-alone costs,Ramsey prices,and postal rates

This paper discusses two external benchmarks for assessing the results of the 1990 postal rate proceeding. First, we generate stand-alone cost estimates for third-class bulk advertising mail, based on market data from private mail carriers. Second, we derive Ramsey optimal prices for all classes of mail. Private delivery costs for bulk advertising are significantly below the third-class bulk regular rates adopted by the U.S. Postal Rate Commission, indicating that the new third-class rates are well above stand-alone costs for an efficient enterprise. Moreover, the Ramsey price analysis suggests that the rate structure adopted reflects, at least implicitly, considerations other than economic efficiency.     

Asymmetric equilibria under price cap regulation

This study analyzes the effects of a price-cap regulation on market outcomes in Cournot and Stackelberg duopolies. Although two firms are ex-ante identical, there are asymmetric Cournot equilibria as well as the symmetric equilibrium under the price-cap regulation, when the price-cap level is binding. By contrast, the Stackelberg equilibrium is unique and equivalent to the most asymmetric Cournot equilibrium under a binding price-cap level. We present several comparative statics results with respect to the equilibrium outcomes. The main concern of this study is the welfare effect of a change in a price-cap level. We show that when asymmetric Cournot equilibria or the Stackelberg equilibrium are focused on, a reduction in a price-cap level may be socially harmful even if the price-cap level is more than the competitive price.     

Strategic Choice of the Price Structure and Entry Deterrence Under Price Cap Regulation

This paper shows that a price‐capped firm under the threat of entry in some of the markets it serves can strategically manipulate its price structure to deter entry. In doing so, the regulated firm uses the price cap constraint as a commitment device to an aggressive pricing behaviour in case of entry. A (dynamic) price cap generally entails that the prices allowed today are a function of the previous‐period prices and that the tighter is the constraint on each price, the larger is the quantity sold of this good in the previous period. Hence, the regulated firm may strategically choose its price structure before entry to place a tighter regulatory control on the prices set in the (potentially) competitive markets and to make it optimal to charge in these markets – in case of entry – prices so low that entry is unprofitable.     

Strategic delegation under quality competition

This paper examines strategic manipulations of incentive contracts in a model where firms compete in quality as well as in price. Compensation schemes for managers are based on a linear combination of profits and sales. For a given level of quality, a firm desires to reduce the manager's compensation when product sales increase; this serves as the firm's commitment to raise prices. Nevertheless, in general, a manager has a stronger incentive to produce goods of higher quality if he is compensated according to sales. Therefore, a compensation scheme that penalizes a manager when sales increase may result in products that are inferior to those of its rival. We show that, depending on the nature of quality, a positive weight on sales may be desirable when firms compete in quality and price. Welfare implications are also explored.