In this paper we establish that there are large and persistent differences in final transaction prices for identical new cars, and that demographic characteristics explain at least 20% of the observed variation. Controlling for all observable aspects of the transaction, older consumers perform...

In this paper we study mergers in two-sided industries. While mergers have been studied extensively in traditional industries, and there is a large and rapidly evolving literature on two-sided markets, there has been little work empirically examining mergers in these markets. We present a model...

This paper studies the role of imperfect information in explaining price dispersion. We use a new panel dataset on the U.S. retail gasoline industry, and propose a new test of temporal price dispersion to establish the importance of consumer search. We show that price rankings vary significantly...

In the late 1990s, the Canadian newspaper industry underwent rapid consolidation with a few conglomerates controlling the vast majority of daily papers. Over a 4 year period, about three-fourths of Canada s daily newspapers changed ownership. While the issue re-ceived considerable attention and...

I examine the case of a firm that practices both second-degree and third-degree price discrimination. I present a model showing conditions under which the premium for higher quality can either rise or fall as the firm implements group pricing. I then use new data from a regional airline to...