In 1938, Harold Hotelling argued that the optimum of the general welfare corresponds to the sale of everything at marginal cost and that therefore government revenues should be used to subsidize all industries having large fixed costs. Ronald Coase's 1946 article The Marginal Cost Controversy...

Patent scope is central to the sale of ideas, which can spur economic growth and provide significant gains from trade. Awarding an inventor a patent on a new idea partially solves a commitment problem that would otherwise prevent the inventor from selling the idea. (Arrow, 1962). In the absence...

There is no widely accepted definition of price discrimination with differentiated products. Either absolute price-cost differences or percentage price-cost markups are used as benchmarks for comparison. I show that the two criteria are qualitatively different: one may indicate price...

There is no widely accepted definition of price discrimination with differentiated products. Either absolute price-cost differences or percentage price-cost markups are used as benchmarks for comparison. I show that the two criteria are qualitatively different: one may indicate price...

This paper presents an easy-to-use measure of patent scope that is grounded both in patent law and in the practices of patent attorneys. We validate our measure by showing both that patent attorneys' subjective assessments of scope agree with our estimates, and that the behaviour of patenters is...

The effects of mergers on the media marketplace have historically failed to live up to dire predictions. Mergers are often a response to technological upheaval and turbulence in the media industry and firms should be allowed to experiment with such alternative business models with the intent on...

What price should entrants pay an incumbent monopoly for use of its assets? Courts, legislators, and regulators have at times mandated that incumbent monopolies lease assets required for the production of a retail service to entrants in efforts to increase the competitiveness of retail markets....

What price should entrants pay an incumbent monopoly for use of its assets? Courts, legislators, and regulators have at times mandated that incumbent monopolies lease assets required for the production of a retail service to entrants in efforts to increase the competitiveness of retail markets....

In linear programming, a simple observation on duality allows us to break down a long-run marginal cost into a marginal operating cost and a marginal equivalent investment cost. This marginal equivalent investment cost is an acceptable means of allocating the equivalent investment cost to the...