The standard approach to identifying second degree price discrimination is based on examining correlations between product menus and prices. When product menus are endogenous, however, tests for price discrimination may be biased by the fact that unobservables affecting costs or demand may...

The presence of private information about a firm can affect the competition among potential lenders. In the Sharpe (1990) model of information asymmetry among lenders (with the von Thadden (2004) correction), an uninformed outside bank faces a winner's curse when competing with an informed...

The bank lending channel of monetary policy suggests that banks play a special role in the transmission of monetary policy. We look for this special role by examining the business strategies of banks as it relates to mortgage funding and mortgage lending. "Traditional banks" have a large supply...

Households who wish to extract home equity through refinancing their mortgage face a hidden transaction cost. The real value of the fixed nominal mortgage payment declines over time with inflation. The change in the real value of the mortgage payments from taking on a new mortgage is positive...