IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/ajagec/v87y2005i1p85-102.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Retail Price Fixity as a Facilitating Mechanism

Author

Listed:
  • Timothy J. Richards
  • Paul M. Patterson

Abstract

Previous theoretical explanations for retail price fixity show that fixed retail prices can be consistent with either competitive or imperfectly competitive behavior. We develop a conceptual model of retail pricing wherein fixed price points are facilitating mechanisms for tacit collusion. A non-cooperative equilibrium in fixed retail prices is supported through credible threats to revert to Nash pricing if cheating is suspected. We test the implications of this model using a two-stage, ordered probit approach in weekly supermarket pricing data. The results show that price fixity does support collusive equilibria among retailers, but other factors may also explain retail price behavior. Copyright 2005, Oxford University Press.

Suggested Citation

  • Timothy J. Richards & Paul M. Patterson, 2005. "Retail Price Fixity as a Facilitating Mechanism," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 87(1), pages 85-102.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:ajagec:v:87:y:2005:i:1:p:85-102
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/j.0002-9092.2005.00704.x
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Irz, Xavier & Mazzocchi, Mario & Réquillart, Vincent & Soler, Louis-Georges, 2015. "Research in Food Economics: past trends and new challenges," Revue d'Etudes en Agriculture et Environnement, Editions NecPlus, vol. 96(01), pages 187-237, March.
    2. José Juan Cáceres-Hernández & Gloria Martín-Rodríguez, 2007. "Heterogeneous Seasonal Patterns in Agricultural Data and Evolving Splines," The IUP Journal of Agricultural Economics, IUP Publications, vol. 0(3), pages 48-65, July.
    3. Atle Oglend & Frank Asche & Hans‐Martin Straume, 2022. "Estimating Pricing Rigidities in Bilateral Transactions Markets," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 104(1), pages 209-227, January.
    4. Timothy J. Richards, 2022. "Agribusiness and policy failures," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 44(1), pages 350-363, March.
    5. Carlo Russo & Rachael Goodhue, 2018. "Farmgate prices, retail prices, and supermarkets' pricing decisions: An integrated approach," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 34(1), pages 24-43, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:ajagec:v:87:y:2005:i:1:p:85-102. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aaeaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.