Computing welfare losses from data under imperfect competition with heterogeneous goods

B-Tier
Journal: International Journal of Industrial Organization
Year: 2009
Volume: 27
Issue: 6
Pages: 646-654

Authors (2)

Score contribution per author:

1.005 = (α=2.01 / 2 authors) × 1.0x B-tier

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

Abstract

We study the percentage of welfare losses (PWL) yielded by imperfect competition under product differentiation. When demand is linear, even if prices, outputs, costs and the number of firms can be observed, PWL is arbitrary in both Cournot and Bertrand equilibria. If in addition the elasticity of demand (resp. cross elasticity of demand) is known, we can calculate PWL in a Cournot (resp. Bertrand) equilibrium. When demand is isoelastic and there are many firms, PWL can be computed from prices, outputs, costs and the number of firms. We find that price-marginal cost margins and demand elasticities may influence PWL in a counterintuitive way. We also provide conditions under which PWL increases or decreases with concentration.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:eee:indorg:v:27:y:2009:i:6:p:646-654
Journal Field
Industrial Organization
Author Count
2
Added to Database
2026-01-25