Posted by Social Science Research Network
Does Price Discrimination Intensify Competition? Implications for Antitrust – James C. Cooper (George Mason University School of Law – Law & Economics Center), Luke Froeb (Vanderbilt University – Strategy and Business Economics), Daniel P. O’Brien (Federal Trade Commission – Bureau of Economics), Steven Tschantz (Vanderbilt University – Department of Mathematics)
ABSTRACT: As a general proposition, antitrust law is hostile to price discrimination. This hostility appears to derive from a comparison of perfect competition (with no price discrimination) to monopoly (with price discrimination). Importantly, economists have known for some time that some forms of price discrimination by oligopolists yield different welfare outcomes than price discrimination by a monopolist. This article focuses on the antitrust implications of price discrimination based on consumer location by spatial competitors that, in contrast to monopoly price discrimination, lowers prices for all consumers. In an important class of spatial models and many real world markets, the consumers to whom one firm would like to raise price – its strong market – are another firm’s weak market to which it would like to lower price. When this “best-response asymmetry” exists, the equilibrium outcome of spatial competitors reacting to each other’s discriminatory price reductions may be lower prices for all consumers and lower profits for all firms, compared to an equilibrium in which all firms offer uniform pricing to all consumers. We identify three areas of antitrust that could benefit from this economic insight: mergers of spatial competitors; the use of price discrimination to infer market power; and Robinson-Patman enforcement.
Featured News
Uruguayan Antitrust Scrutiny Puts Major Meatpacking Deal Between Marfrig and Minerva on Hold
May 19, 2024 by
CPI
Alaska Airlines Seeks Dismissal of Consumer Lawsuit Over $1.9 Billion Hawaiian Airlines Buy
May 19, 2024 by
CPI
Idaho Attorney General Orders Split of Kootenai Health and Syringa Hospital
May 19, 2024 by
CPI
Court Rejects T-Mobile’s Appeal Bid in Antitrust Case Over Sprint Merger
May 19, 2024 by
CPI
Google Requests Judge, Not Jury, to Decide on Antitrust Case
May 19, 2024 by
CPI
Antitrust Mix by CPI
Antitrust Chronicle® – Ecosystems
May 9, 2024 by
CPI
Mapping Antitrust onto Digital Ecosystems
May 9, 2024 by
CPI
Ecosystems and Competition Law: A Law and Political Economy Approach
May 9, 2024 by
CPI
Ecosystem Theories of Harm: What is Beyond the Buzzword?
May 9, 2024 by
CPI
Open Ecosystems: Benefits, Challenges, and Implications for Antitrust
May 9, 2024 by
CPI