IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ces/ceswps/_4066.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Measuring Strategic Firm Interaction in Product-Quality Choices: The Case of Airline Flight Frequency

Author

Listed:
  • Jan K. Brueckner
  • Dan Luo

Abstract

This paper investigates strategic interaction among airlines in product-quality choices. Using an instrumental variables approach, the paper estimates flight-frequency reaction functions, which relate an airline’s frequency on a route to its own characteristics and to the frequencies of competing airlines. A positive reaction function slope is found in some cases, indicating the presence of strategic interaction in the choice of frequencies. The paper also asks whether multimarket contact generates mutual forbearance in frequency competition, finding no evidence for such an effect.

Suggested Citation

  • Jan K. Brueckner & Dan Luo, 2013. "Measuring Strategic Firm Interaction in Product-Quality Choices: The Case of Airline Flight Frequency," CESifo Working Paper Series 4066, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_4066
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp4066.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Volodymyr Bilotkach, 2011. "Multimarket Contact and Intensity of Competition: Evidence from an Airline Merger," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 38(1), pages 95-115, January.
    2. Lazzarini, Sérgio G. & Artes, Rinaldo & Caetano, Marco Antonio L. & Moura, Marcelo L. & Goldberg, Marcelo B. & Silva, César E., 2007. "Does it pay to anticipate competitor reactions?," Insper Working Papers wpe_86, Insper Working Paper, Insper Instituto de Ensino e Pesquisa.
    3. Bilotkach, Volodymyr & Fageda, Xavier & Flores-Fillol, Ricardo, 2010. "Scheduled service versus personal transportation: The role of distance," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 60-72, January.
    4. Vickner, Steven S. & Davies, Stephen P., 1999. "Estimating Market Power and Pricing Conduct in a Product-Differentiated Oligopoly: The Case of the Domestic Spaghetti Sauce Industry," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 31(1), pages 1-13, April.
    5. Matt Shum & G Crawford, 2003. "Monopoly Quality Degradation in Cable Television," Economics Working Paper Archive 502, The Johns Hopkins University,Department of Economics.
    6. Arturs Kalnins, 2003. "Hamburger Prices and Spatial Econometrics," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(4), pages 591-616, December.
    7. Borenstein, Severin & Netz, Janet, 1999. "Why do all the flights leave at 8 am?: Competition and departure-time differentiation in airline markets," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 611-640, July.
    8. Michael J. Mazzeo, 2002. "Product Choice and Oligopoly Market Structure," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 33(2), pages 221-242, Summer.
    9. William N. Evans & Ioannis N. Kessides, 1994. "Living by the "Golden Rule": Multimarket Contact in the U. S. Airline Industry," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 109(2), pages 341-366.
    10. Charles F. Manski, 1993. "Identification of Endogenous Social Effects: The Reflection Problem," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 60(3), pages 531-542.
    11. Iain Cockburn & Rebecca Henderson, 1994. "Racing To Invest? The Dynamics of Competition in Ethical Drug Discovery," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 3(3), pages 481-519, September.
    12. Diego Escobari & Sang-Yeob Lee, 2012. "Demand shifting across flights and airports in a spatial competition model," Letters in Spatial and Resource Sciences, Springer, vol. 5(3), pages 175-183, October.
    13. Grabowski, Henry G & Baxter, Nevins D, 1973. "Rivalry in Industrial Research and Development," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(3), pages 209-235, July.
    14. Joris Pinkse & Margaret E. Slade & Craig Brett, 2002. "Spatial Price Competition: A Semiparametric Approach," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(3), pages 1111-1153, May.
    15. Jaskold Gabszewicz, J. & Thisse, J. -F., 1979. "Price competition, quality and income disparities," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 340-359, June.
    16. Schipper, Youdi & Rietveld, Piet & Nijkamp, Peter, 2003. "Airline deregulation and external costs: a welfare analysis," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 699-718, September.
    17. Jan Brueckner & Ricardo Flores-Fillol, 2007. "Airline Schedule Competition," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 30(3), pages 161-177, May.
    18. DUJARDIN, Claire & PEETERS, Dominique & THOMAS, Isabelle, 2009. "Neighbourhood effects and endogeneity issues," LIDAM Reprints CORE 2173, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    19. Pai, Vivek, 2010. "On the factors that affect airline flight frequency and aircraft size," Journal of Air Transport Management, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 169-177.
    20. Jan K. Brueckner, 2010. "Schedule Competition Revisited," Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, University of Bath, vol. 44(3), pages 261-285, September.
    21. Shah, Nilopa & Brueckner, Jan K., 2012. "Price and frequency competition in freight transportation," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 46(6), pages 938-953.
    22. Michaela Draganska & Michael Mazzeo & Katja Seim, 2009. "Beyond plain vanilla: Modeling joint product assortment and pricing decisions," Quantitative Marketing and Economics (QME), Springer, vol. 7(2), pages 105-146, June.
    23. Berry, Steven & Levinsohn, James & Pakes, Ariel, 1995. "Automobile Prices in Market Equilibrium," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 63(4), pages 841-890, July.
    24. Andrews,Donald W. K. & Stock,James H. (ed.), 2005. "Identification and Inference for Econometric Models," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521844413.
    25. Brueckner, Jan K., 1998. "Testing for Strategic Interaction Among Local Governments: The Case of Growth Controls," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(3), pages 438-467, November.
    26. Tirtha Dhar & Jean‐Paul Chavas & Ronald W. Cotterill & Brian W. Gould, 2005. "An Econometric Analysis of Brand‐Level Strategic Pricing Between Coca‐Cola Company and PepsiCo," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(4), pages 905-931, December.
    27. Ronald Cotterill & William Putsis, 2000. "Market Share and Price Setting Behavior for Private Labels and National Brands," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 17(1), pages 17-39, August.
    28. Schipper, Youdi & Nijkamp, Peter & Rietveld, Piet, 2007. "Deregulation and welfare in airline markets: An analysis of frequency equilibria," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 178(1), pages 194-206, April.
    29. Steven C. Salop, 1979. "Monopolistic Competition with Outside Goods," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(1), pages 141-156, Spring.
    30. 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.
    31. Stock, James H & Wright, Jonathan H & Yogo, Motohiro, 2002. "A Survey of Weak Instruments and Weak Identification in Generalized Method of Moments," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 20(4), pages 518-529, October.
    32. Aguirregabiria, Victor & Ho, Chun-Yu, 2012. "A dynamic oligopoly game of the US airline industry: Estimation and policy experiments," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 168(1), pages 156-173.
    33. d'Aspremont, C & Gabszewicz, Jean Jaskold & Thisse, J-F, 1979. "On Hotelling's "Stability in Competition"," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(5), pages 1145-1150, September.
    34. Reimer Jeffrey J, 2004. "Market Conduct in the U.S. Ready-to-Eat Cereal Industry," Journal of Agricultural & Food Industrial Organization, De Gruyter, vol. 2(1), pages 1-29, November.
    35. Kevin E. Henrickson, 2012. "Spatial Competition And Strategic Firm Relocation," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 50(2), pages 364-379, April.
    36. Steven Berry & Panle Jia, 2010. "Tracing the Woes: An Empirical Analysis of the Airline Industry," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(3), pages 1-43, August.
    37. Steven T. Berry & Joel Waldfogel, 2001. "Do Mergers Increase Product Variety? Evidence from Radio Broadcasting," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(3), pages 1009-1025.
    38. Li Zou & Martin Dresner & Robert Windle, 2011. "Many Fields of Battle How Cost Structure Affects Competition Across Multiple Markets," Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, University of Bath, vol. 45(1), pages 21-40, January.
    39. Steven T. Berry, 1994. "Estimating Discrete-Choice Models of Product Differentiation," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 25(2), pages 242-262, Summer.
    40. Crawford, Gregory S & Shum, Matthew, 2007. "Monopoly Quality Degradation and Regulation in Cable Television," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 50(1), pages 181-219, February.
    41. Gregory S. Crawford & Oleksandr Shcherbakov & Matthew Shum, 2015. "The welfare effects of endogenous quality choice in cable television markets," ECON - Working Papers 202, Department of Economics - University of Zurich.
    42. Jan Brueckner & Darin Lee & Ethan Singer, 2014. "City-Pairs Versus Airport-Pairs: A Market-Definition Methodology for the Airline Industry," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 44(1), pages 1-25, February.
    43. Federico Revelli, 2005. "On Spatial Public Finance Empirics," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 12(4), pages 475-492, August.
    44. Dhar, Tirtha & Chavas, Jean- Paul & Cotterill, Ronald W. & Gould, Brian W., 2005. "An Economic Analysis of Brand-Level Strategic Pricing Between Coca-Cola Company and Pepsi," Working Papers 201538, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Food System Research Group.
    45. Jan K. Brueckner, 2003. "Strategic Interaction Among Governments: An Overview of Empirical Studies," International Regional Science Review, , vol. 26(2), pages 175-188, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Benny Mantin & Eran Rubin, 2016. "Fare Prediction Websites and Transaction Prices: Empirical Evidence from the Airline Industry," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 35(4), pages 640-655, July.
    2. Gayle Philip G. & Thomas Tyson, 2015. "Product Quality Effects of International Airline Alliances, Antitrust Immunity, and Domestic Mergers," Review of Network Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 14(1), pages 45-74, March.
    3. Calzada, Joan & Fageda, Xavier & Safronov, Roman, 2022. "How do global airline alliances affect flight frequency? Evidence from Russia," Journal of Air Transport Management, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    4. Doi, Naoshi & Ohashi, Hiroshi, 2019. "Market structure and product quality: A study of the 2002 Japanese airline merger," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 158-193.
    5. Fageda, Xavier & Teixidó, Jordi J., 2022. "Pricing carbon in the aviation sector: Evidence from the European emissions trading system," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    6. Fageda, Xavier, 2014. "What hurts the dominant airlines at hub airports?," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 177-189.
    7. Yimga, Jules, 2022. "Code-sharing agreements and path quality in the US airline industry," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 369-385.
    8. Calzada, Joan & Fageda, Xavier, 2023. "Airport dominance, route network design and flight delays," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 170(C).
    9. Valido, Jorge & Socorro, M. Pilar & Medda, Francesca, 2020. "Airport capacity and entry deterrence: Low cost versus full service airlines," Economics of Transportation, Elsevier, vol. 22(C).
    10. Chen, Yongmin & Gayle, Philip G., 2019. "Mergers and product quality: Evidence from the airline industry," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 96-135.
    11. Joseph Kuehn, 2020. "Strategic Complementarities in Bank Branching Decisions," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 68(4), pages 640-692, December.
    12. Yimga, Jules, 2017. "Airline on-time performance and its effects on consumer choice behavior," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 12-25.
    13. Cattaneo, Mattia & Malighetti, Paolo & Redondi, Renato & Salanti, Andrea, 2018. "Changes in frequencies and price variations on point-to-point routes: The case of easyJet," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 60-70.
    14. Czerny, Achim I. & Cowan, Simon & Zhang, Anming, 2017. "How to mix per-flight and per-passenger based airport charges: The oligopoly case," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 483-500.
    15. Kang Hua Cao & Betty Krier & Chia-Mei Liu & Brian McNamara & Jerrod Sharpe, 2017. "The Nonlinear Effects of Market Structure on Service Quality: Evidence from the U.S. Airline Industry," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 51(1), pages 43-73, August.
    16. Bet, Germán, 2021. "Product specification under a threat of entry: Evidence from Airlines’ departure times," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    17. Brueckner, Jan K. & Flores-Fillol, Ricardo, 2020. "Market structure and quality determination for complementary products: Alliances and service quality in the airline industry," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    18. Fageda, Xavier & Fioravanti, Reinaldo & Ricover, Andy & Café, Eduardo & Ansaldo, Mariano, 2023. "Econometric analysis of the determinants of air cargo services supply in Latin America and the Caribbean," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 33-44.
    19. Greenfield, Daniel, 2014. "Competition and service quality: New evidence from the airline industry," Economics of Transportation, Elsevier, vol. 3(1), pages 80-89.
    20. Lijesen, Mark & Behrens, Christiaan, 2017. "The spatial scope of airline competition," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 1-13.
    21. Doi, Naoshi & Kono, Tatsuhito & Suzaki, Izumo, 2023. "Optimizing Multiple Airport Charges with Endogenous Airline Quality Considering the Marginal Cost of Public Funds," MPRA Paper 116176, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    22. Fageda, Xavier & Flores-Fillol, Ricardo & Lin, Ming Hsin, 2020. "Vertical differentiation and airline alliances: The effect of antitrust immunity," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kuangnen Cheng & Hui-Ping Chen & Jason Lee, 2015. "Competition behavior in service frequency for U.S. airlines," Service Business, Springer;Pan-Pacific Business Association, vol. 9(1), pages 1-16, March.
    2. Fageda, Xavier & Flores-Fillol, Ricardo & Lin, Ming Hsin, 2020. "Vertical differentiation and airline alliances: The effect of antitrust immunity," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    3. Firgo, Matthias & Kügler, Agnes, 2018. "Cooperative pricing in spatially differentiated markets," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 51-67.
    4. Meilin Ma & Ralph Siebert, 2021. "The Impact of Private Label Introduction on Assortment, Prices, and Profits of Retailers," CESifo Working Paper Series 9380, CESifo.
    5. Jan K. Brueckner & Ricardo Flores-Fillol, 2006. "Airline Schedule Competition: Product-Quality Choice in a Duopoly Model," Working Papers 050629, University of California-Irvine, Department of Economics.
    6. Yanhao Wei, 2018. "Airline networks, traffic densities, and value of links," Quantitative Marketing and Economics (QME), Springer, vol. 16(3), pages 341-370, September.
    7. Hidalgo, Julian & Oviedo, Juan D., 2014. "The impact of Broadband quality standards on Internet services market structure in Colombia," 25th European Regional ITS Conference, Brussels 2014 101435, International Telecommunications Society (ITS).
    8. Crawford, Gregory S., 2012. "Endogenous product choice: A progress report," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 315-320.
    9. Victor Aguirregabiria & Margaret Slade, 2017. "Empirical models of firms and industries," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 50(5), pages 1445-1488, December.
    10. Doi, Naoshi & Ohashi, Hiroshi, 2019. "Market structure and product quality: A study of the 2002 Japanese airline merger," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 158-193.
    11. Joo Yeon Sun, 2017. "Airline Deregulation and Its Impacts on Air Travel Demand and Airline Competition: Evidence from Korea," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 51(3), pages 343-380, November.
    12. Belleflamme,Paul & Peitz,Martin, 2015. "Industrial Organization," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107687899, January.
    13. Juan Daniel Oviedo & Julian Hidalgo, 2014. "The impact of broadband quality standards on Internet services market structure In colombia," Documentos de Trabajo 12232, Universidad del Rosario.
    14. Mitsukuni Nishida, 2015. "Estimating a Model of Strategic Network Choice: The Convenience-Store Industry in Okinawa," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 34(1), pages 20-38, January.
    15. Hickman, William & Mortimer, Julie Holland, 2016. "Demand Estimation with Availability Variation," SocArXiv qe69j, Center for Open Science.
    16. Ciliberto, Federico & Williams, Jonathan, 2010. "Does Multimarket Contact Facilitate Tacit Collusion? Inference on Conjectural Parameters in the Airline Industry," MPRA Paper 24888, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Philippe Choné & Lionel Wilner, 2022. "Financial Incentives and Competitive Pressure: The Case of the Hospital Industry," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 20(2), pages 626-666.
    18. Bontemps, Christian & Remmy, Kevin & Wei, Jiangyu, 2021. "Ex-post evaluation of the American Airlines-US Airways merger: a structural approach," TSE Working Papers 21-1258, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    19. Matthias Firgo & Agnes Kügler, 2014. "Detecting Collusion in Spatially Differentiated Markets," Department of Economics Working Papers wuwp188, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Department of Economics.
    20. Brueckner, Jan K. & Flores-Fillol, Ricardo, 2020. "Market structure and quality determination for complementary products: Alliances and service quality in the airline industry," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    airlines; reaction function; product quality; flight frequency;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L10 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - General
    • L93 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Transportation and Utilities - - - Air Transportation

    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:ces:ceswps:_4066. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: Klaus Wohlrabe (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.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.