Showing 1 - 10 of 712
Previous research shows that firms shroud high add-on prices in competitive markets with naive consumers leading to inefficiency. We analyze the effects of regulatory intervention via educating naive consumers on equilibrium prices and welfare. Our model allows firms to shroud, unshroud, or...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10009367427
This Paper introduces optimal competition: the best form of competition in an industry that a competition authority can … competition outcome in an industry becomes more competitive as more money is spent in the industry, as the competition authority … puts less weight on producer surplus and more weight on employment. The relation between competition and entry costs is U …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005789187
television regulation in light of these developments. It surveys the dismal empirical record on the effects of price regulation … in cable and the more encouraging but incomplete evidence on the benefits of satellite and telco competition. It …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011084592
Many utility markets are now being opened to competition, and some regulators have expressed the hope that this will … make the regulation of consumer prices unnecessary. In this paper, entrants offer (differentiated) 'added value', but … level of its costs. This is likely to be the case in the UK's energy industries, but competition may be able to replace …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005136643
The paper studies the impact of market integration on investment incentives in non-competitive industries. It distinguishes between investment in transportation and production cost-reducing technologies. Each domestic firm is controlled by a national regulator in a common market made of two...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005012490
The paper studies the regulatory design in a industry where the regulated downstream provider of services to final consumers purchases the necessary inputs from an upstream supplier. The model is closely inspired by the UK regulatory mechanism for the railway network. Its philosophy is one of...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005792445
The paper applies a gravity model to 1980-1996 annual non-fuel imports data for 58 countries to quantify the effects of recently created or revamped PTAs on trade. We modify the usual gravity equation to identify separate effects of PTAs on intra-bloc trade, members' total imports and their...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005504431
The paper analyses the degree of structural change that has occurred within the EC since the launch of the internal market programme. It is divided into three parts: the first examines inter-sectoral shifts in the pattern of specialization within EC manufacturing, and finds relatively little...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005504607
Regional integration is on the rise again, despite its apparent failure among developing countries in the past. The paper first surveys the ambiguous economics of customs unions. We emphasize that the traditional dichotomy between `trade creation' and `trade diversion' is not particularly...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005497701
Suppose that an opportunity arises for two countries to negotiate a free trade agreement (FTA). Will an FTA between these countries be politically viable? If so, what form will it take? We address these questions using a political economy framework that emphasizes the interaction between...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005497994