L22 - Firm Organization and Market Structure
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Uncertain Costs and Vertical Differentiation in an Insurance Duopoly
Classical oligopoly models predict that firms differentiate vertically as a way of softening price competition, but some metrics suggest very little quality differentiation in the U.S. auto insurance market. -
Price Negotiation in Differentiated Products Markets: Evidence from the Canadian Mortgage Market
This paper measures market power in a decentralized market where contracts are determined through a search and negotiation process. The mortgage industry has many institutional features which suggest competitiveness: homogeneous contracts, negotiable rates, and, for a given consumer, common lending costs across lenders. -
Credit in a Tiered Payments System
Payments systems are typically characterized by some degree of tiering, with upstream firms (clearing agents) providing settlement accounts to downstream institutions that wish to clear and settle payments indirectly in these systems (indirect clearers). -
The Economic Theory of Retail Pricing: A Survey
The types of contracts that arise in a typical vertical manufacturer–retailer relationship are more sophisticated than usually assumed in standard macroeconomic models.