Competition with Exclusive Contracts and Market-Share Discounts

S-Tier
Journal: American Economic Review
Year: 2013
Volume: 103
Issue: 6
Pages: 2384-2411

Authors (2)

Score contribution per author:

4.022 = (α=2.01 / 2 authors) × 4.0x S-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

We analyze firms that compete by means of exclusive contracts and market-share discounts (conditional on the seller's share of customers' total purchases). With incomplete information about demand, firms have a unilateral incentive to use these contractual arrangements to better extract buyers' informational rents. However, exclusive contracts intensify competition, thus reducing prices and profits and (in all Pareto undominated equilibria) increasing welfare. Market-share discounts, by contrast, produce a double marginalization effect that leads to higher prices and harms buyers. We discuss the implications of these results for competition policy

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:aea:aecrev:v:103:y:2013:i:6:p:2384-2411
Journal Field
General
Author Count
2
Added to Database
2026-01-25