Showing 1 - 10 of 188
Did regulatory reforms that lowered barriers to competition among U.S. banks increase or decrease the quality of information that banks disclose to the public and regulators? We find that an intensification of competition reduced abnormal accruals of loan loss provisions and the frequency with...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011103497
We propose a method for constructing price indices when retailers use periodic sales to price-discriminate amongst heterogeneous customers. To do so, we introduce a model in which Loyal customers buy one brand and do not strategically time purchases, while Bargain Hunters always pay the lowest...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011103513
The debate over privatizing Medicare stems from a fundamental disagreement about whether privatization would primarily generate consumer surplus for individuals or producer surplus for insurance companies and health care providers. This paper investigates this question by studying an existing...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011105228
The asset allocation of university endowments has recently shifted dramatically towards alternative investments. In this paper we examine the role played by strategic competition in motivating this shift. Using a metric capturing competition for undergraduate applications, we test whether...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011106382
We study a new data set of US sports card conventions in order to evaluate the pricing theory of two-sided markets … findings: first, consumer pricing decreases with competition at any reasonable distance, but pricing to dealers is insensitive …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011188519
This expository paper describes the factors that contribute to failure of health insurance markets, and the regulatory mechanisms that have been and can be used to combat these failures. Standardized contracts and creditable coverage mandates are discussed, along with premium support, enrollment...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011188566
This paper provides a new and simple model of endogenous horizontal product differentiation based on a standard demand structure derived from quadratic utility. One objective of the paper is to explain the “empirical Bertrand paradox” – the failure to observe homogeneous product Bertrand...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011189108
Increasingly detailed consumer information makes sophisticated price discrimination possible. At fine levels of aggregation, demand may not obey standard regularity conditions. We propose a new randomized sales mechanism for such environments. Bidders can "buy-it-now" at a posted price, or...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010821708
We document cross-individual variation in U.S. credit card borrowing costs (APRs) that is large enough to explain substantial differences in household saving rates. Borrower default risk and card characteristics explain roughly 40% of APRs. The remaining dispersion exists because a borrower can...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010796557
This paper provides the first experimental evidence on the effect of increased competition on the prices and quality of goods. We rely on an intervention that randomized the entry of 61 retail firms (grocery stores) into 72 local markets in the context of a conditional cash transfer program that...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010768998