We test whether occupational licensing undercuts a key goal of digital marketplaces-- to increase social surplus by increasing the effectiveness of customer search. Our setting is a large online marketplace in the $500B home services industry where a platform converts customer search into sales...

We study the performance of different regulatory approaches for the expansion of electricity transmission networks in the light of realistic demand patterns and fluctuating wind power. In particular, we are interested in the relative performance of a combined merchant-regulatory mechanism...

Launching and stimulating competition in telecommunications markets is an important policy goal. It contains two elements: to encourage entry and to make competition effective such that consumers benefit. The first one requires that entrants can make profits after investing in infrastructure so...

Abstract In markets with competing interconnected networks like mobile telecommunication markets investments affect the investor’s and also any competitors’ profits. In a theoretical model it is shown that cost-reducing investments reduce the investor’s termination rates and increase...

In the context of yardstick regulation with long-lived assets, the influence of investment cycles and thereof resulting heterogeneous capital structures on the ability to recover capital is quite important. Investment decisions are based on whole investment cycles of the infrastructure. It is...

In the context of yardstick regulation with long-lived assets, the influence of heterogeneous investment cycles on the ability to recover capital is found to be important. The application of efficient firm standards based on historic (straight-line) depreciation given heterogeneous investment...

Competition between parallel infrastructures incorporates opposing welfare effects. The gain from reduced deadweight loss might be out- weighed by the inefficient duplication of an existing infrastructure. Using data from broadband internet access for Western Europe 2000-2004, this paper...

Abstract In markets with competing interconnected networks like mobile telecommunication markets investments affect the investor’s and also any competitors’ profits. In a theoretical model it is shown that cost-reducing investments reduce the investor’s termination rates and increase...