Platform marketplaces can potentially steer buyers to certain sellers by recommending or guaranteeing those sellers. Money-back guarantees—which create a direct financial stake for the platform in seller performance—might be particularly effective at steering, as they align buyer and...

Firms spend substantial resources on marketing and selling. Interpreting this as evidence of frictions in product markets, which require firms to spend resources on customer acquisition, this paper develops a search theoretic model of firm dynamics in frictional product markets. Introducing...

We study the nature of peer effects in the market for new cell phones. Our analysis builds on de-identified data from Facebook that combine information on social networks with information on users' cell phone models. To identify peer effects, we use variation in friends' new phone acquisitions...

Hirschman's Exit, Voice, and Loyalty highlights the role of “voice” in disciplining firms for low quality. We develop a formal model of voice as a relational contact between firms and consumers and show that voice is more likely to emerge in concentrated markets. We test this model using...

Products often bundle together many functions e.g., smartphones. The firm develops the big idea (which functions to bundle) and then chooses one supplier per function. We develop a model featuring holdup in which the firm's bargaining power declines in the number of suppliers. Greater scope as...

The effective governance of local public services depends critically on the civic engagement of local citizens. However, recent efforts to promote effective citizen oversight of the public-sector services in developing countries have had mixed results. This study discusses and evaluates a...

M-Pesa is a mobile phone based money transfer system in Kenya which grew at a blistering pace following its inception in 2007. We examine how M-Pesa is used as well as its economic impacts. Analyzing data from two waves of individual data on financial access in Kenya, we find that increased use...