This thesis consists of three papers. Industries that motivated this analysis range are exclusive clubs (Chapter 1) and pharmaceuticals (Chapters 2 and 3). A common thread is the study of the strategic behavior of monopoly or monopoly-like firms and the implications of such behavior.Chapter 1...

This paper derives firm boundaries as the outcome of an equilibrium coordination mechanism. The analysis is premised on the notion that efficient production and distribution are achieved through a mechanism that coordinates three basic activities: i) input acquisition, ii) production, iii)...

In certain types of industries contracts for sales agents include both commission payments for sales and clawbacks of these payments if existing clients are not retained. This paper provides a model that shows that contracts with these features arise in equilibrium in environments having: i)...

Whatever the statutory differences or language differences in Guidelines between Canada and the US the application of competition rules and procedures is remarkably similar in the two countries. Recent adjustments to the role of efficiencies in merger analysis in the two countries reveal a...

In perhaps no other area of competition policy is there greater dispute over the appropriate legal rule as there is over the practice of tying. The authors consider when tying is anti-competitive and when the practice should be prohibited, adopting economic efficiency as the policy criterion....

When have market participants the incentive to strike contracts that exclude potential entrants? This paper synthesizes the theory of exclusionary contracts and applies the theory to a recent antitrust case, Nielsen. We consider an incumbent facing potential entry and contracting with both...

This paper reexamines the economics of two common features of credit card networks: the interchange fee paid by merchant banks, or acquirers, to cardholder banks, or issuers; and the restraint commonly placed on merchants against surcharging for credit card transactions. We show that the...

A vertical MFN prohibits a multi-product retailer charging more for a supplier's product than for the products of rival suppliers. In the market for credit card services, this restraint takes the form of a no-surcharge rule: that a retailer not surcharge for transactions with a particular credit...