Web search technologies are fundamental tools to easily navigate through the huge amount of information available in the Internet. One particular type of search technologies are the so- called shopbots, or comparison sites. The emergence of Internet shopbots and their implications for price...

We examine whether bundling in telecommunications services reduces churn using a series of large, independent cross sections of household decisions. To identify the effect of bundling, we construct a pseudo-panel dataset and utilize a linear, dynamic panel-data model, supplemented by...

This paper considers identification and estimation of a general model for online price competition. We show that when the number of competing firms is unknown, the underlying parameters of the model can still be identified and estimated employing recently developed results on measurement error....

The Babylonian bridal auction, described by Herodotus, is regarded as one of the earliest uses of an auction in history. Yet, to our knowledge, the literature lacks a formal equilibrium analysis of this auction. We provide such an analysis for the two-player case with complete and incomplete...

The literature on voluntary agreements studies self-regulation, negotiated agreements and public voluntary programs, typically in the shadow of a legislative threat. Prior studies have examined each of these instruments in isolation, but interactions between them have received less attention. We...

This chapter provides a data-driven overview of the different online platforms that consumers use to search for books and booksellers, and documents how the use of these platforms is shifting over time. Our data suggest that, as a result of digitization, consumers are increasingly conducting...

Under the doctrine of shareholder primacy, the duty of a corporate director is to act for the benefit of the shareholders. This is not the same as profit maximization. It is only the same if shareholders care about profit and nothing else. The current Hobby Lobby case regarding a corporation’s...

Are new versions of products necessarily better? We analyze product innovation by a firm that engages in research and development designed to improve an existing product, the outcome of which is uncertain. If the firm adopts the innovation its modified product appears to consumers as new and...

Antitrust scholars have come to accept the basic ideas about exclusive dealing that Bork articulated in The Antitrust Paradox. Indeed, they have even extended his list of reasons why exclusive dealing can promote economic efficiency. Yet they have also taken up his challenge to explain how...

The Klein-Leffler model explains how the benefit of future reputation can induce firms to produce high quality experience goods, either in a monopoly or an industry with competing firms. We show that reputation can be leveraged across products, but only by a firm with a monopoly on at least one...