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Cartel Stability under Quality Differentiation

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  • Iwan Bos
  • Marco Marini

Abstract

This note considers cartel stability when the cartelized products are vertically differentiated. If market shares are maintained at pre-collusive levels, then the firm with the lowest competitive price-cost margin has the strongest incentive to deviate from the collusive agreement. The lowest-quality supplier has the tightest incentive constraint when the difference in unit production costs is sufficiently small.

Suggested Citation

  • Iwan Bos & Marco Marini, 2018. "Cartel Stability under Quality Differentiation," Papers 1812.10293, arXiv.org.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:1812.10293
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Marco A. Marini, 2018. "Collusive agreements in vertically differentiated markets," Chapters, in: Luis C. Corchón & Marco A. Marini (ed.), Handbook of Game Theory and Industrial Organization, Volume II, chapter 3, pages 34-56, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Jean Tirole, 1988. "The Theory of Industrial Organization," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262200716, April.
    3. Luis C. Corchón & Marco A. Marini (ed.), 2018. "Handbook of Game Theory and Industrial Organization, Volume II," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 17978.
    4. Giulio Ecchia & Luca Lambertini, 1997. "Minimum Quality Standards and Collusion," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(1), pages 101-113, March.
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    6. Symeonidis, George, 1999. "Cartel stability in advertising-intensive and R&D-intensive industries," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 62(1), pages 121-129, January.
    7. Luis C. Corchón & Marco A. Marini (ed.), 2018. "Handbook of Game Theory and Industrial Organization, Volume I," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 16873.
    8. Joseph E. Harrington, Jr, 2006. "How Do Cartels Operate?," Economics Working Paper Archive 531, The Johns Hopkins University,Department of Economics.
    9. Harrington, Joseph E., 2006. "How Do Cartels Operate?," Foundations and Trends(R) in Microeconomics, now publishers, vol. 2(1), pages 1-105, August.
    10. Avner Shaked & John Sutton, 1982. "Relaxing Price Competition Through Product Differentiation," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 49(1), pages 3-13.
    11. Mussa, Michael & Rosen, Sherwin, 1978. "Monopoly and product quality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 301-317, August.
    12. Hackner, Jonas, 1994. "Collusive pricing in markets for vertically differentiated products," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 12(2), pages 155-177, June.
    13. repec:bla:jindec:v:45:y:1997:i:1:p:101-13 is not listed on IDEAS
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Iwan Bos & Marco A. Marini, 2022. "Collusion in quality‐segmented markets," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 24(2), pages 293-323, April.
    2. Innocenti, Federico & Menicucci, Domenico, 2021. "Partial compatibility in oligopoly," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 188(C), pages 351-378.
    3. Bos, Iwan & Marini, Marco A. & Saulle, Riccardo D., 2020. "Cartel formation with quality differentiation," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 36-50.
    4. Leonardo Madio & Aldo Pignataro, 2022. "Collusion sustainability with a capacity constrained firm," "Marco Fanno" Working Papers 0295, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche "Marco Fanno".
    5. Thanos Athanasopoulos & Burak Dindaroglu & Georgios Petropoulos, 2021. "Stability of collusion and quality differentiation- a Nash bargaining approach," Working Papers 43226, Bruegel.
    6. Shenglei Pei & Lijuan Ye & Wei Zhou, 2022. "Application of convolutional neural network under nonlinear excitation function in the construction of employee incentive and constraint model," International Journal of System Assurance Engineering and Management, Springer;The Society for Reliability, Engineering Quality and Operations Management (SREQOM),India, and Division of Operation and Maintenance, Lulea University of Technology, Sweden, vol. 13(3), pages 1142-1153, December.
    7. Döpper, Hendrik & Rasch, Alexander, 2024. "Combinable products, price discrimination, and collusion," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    8. Stanislav Stoykov & Ivan Kostov, 2023. "Price Competition with Differentiated Products on a Two-Dimensional Plane: The Impact of Partial Cartel on Firms’ Profits and Behavior," Games, MDPI, vol. 14(2), pages 1-25, March.
    9. Amit Gayer, 2023. "Duopoly and Endogenous Single Product Quality Strategies," Games, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-11, August.
    10. Neelanjan Sen & Priyansh Minocha & Arghya Dutta, 2023. "Technology licensing and collusion," International Journal of Economic Theory, The International Society for Economic Theory, vol. 19(3), pages 694-752, September.
    11. Leonardo Madio & Aldo Pignataro, 2022. "Collusion Sustainability with a Capacity Constrained Firm," CESifo Working Paper Series 10170, CESifo.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D2 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations
    • D4 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design
    • D43 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Oligopoly and Other Forms of Market Imperfection
    • L1 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance
    • L4 - Industrial Organization - - Antitrust Issues and Policies

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