We describe firm pricing when consumers search passively and follow simple reservation price rules. In stark contrast to other models in the literature, this approach yields equilib- rium price dispersion in pure strategies even when firms have the same marginal costs. In equilibrium, lower...

We analyze an oligopoly model with horizontal di¤erentiation and quality di¤erences. High quality goods are over-priced and under-produced. When the market is fairly covered, low quality products may be pro…table when their social contribution is negative, leading to too many products in...

Advertising messages compete for scarce attention. ?Junk? mail, ?spam? e-mail, and telemarketing calls need both parties to exert effort to generate transactions. Message recipients supply attention depending on average message beneÞt. Senders are motivated by proÞts. Costlier message...

We revisit the fundamental issue of market provision of variety associated with Chamberlin, Spence, and Dixit and Stiglitz when firms sell several products. Both products and firms are envisaged as di?erentiated. We propose a nested demand model where consumers decide upon a firm then which...

We analyze the incidence of ad valorem and unit excise taxes in an oligopolistic industry with differentiated products and price-setting (Bertrand) firms. Both taxes may be passed on to consumers by more than 100 percent, and an increase in the tax rate can increase short run firm profits (and...

This paper considers the relative efficiency of ad valorem and unit taxes in imperfectly competitive markets. We provide a simple proof that ad valorem taxes are welfare-superior to unit taxes in the short run when production costs are identical across firms. The proof covers differentiated...

We investigate what can be learned about the prevalence of work disability using self-reported assessments of work capacity. Although health status is widely recognized as a crucial determinant of labor supply behavior and participation in public transfer programs, there is a long-standing...

This paper presents a dynamic model in which agents adjust their decisions in the direction of higher payoffs, subject to random error. This process produces a probability distribution of players' decisions whose evolution over time is determined by the Fokker-Planck equation. The dynamic...

Regulation of television advertising typically covers both the time devoted to commercials and restrictions on the commodities or services that can be publicized to various audiences (stricter laws often apply to children’s programming). Time restrictions (advertising caps) may improve welfare...

We derive bounds on the ratios of deadweight loss and consumer surplus to producer surplus under Cournot competition. To do so, we introduce a parameterization of the degree of curvature of market demand using the parallel concepts of ?-concavity and ?-convexity. The ?more concave? is demand,...