IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ags/joaaec/15137.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Estimating Market Power And Pricing Conduct In A Product-Differentiated Oligopoly: The Case Of The Domestic Spaghetti Sauce Industry

Author

Listed:
  • Vickner, Steven S.
  • Davies, Stephen P.

Abstract

This paper develops a simultaneous-equations panel data econometric model to obtain point estimates of market power and pricing conduct in a representative product-differentiated, oligopolistic food market. The importance of this class of markets is recognized given its prevalence in the food and fiber system, especially for final consumer food products. The $1.3 billion domestic spaghetti sauce industry is featured. Although the results indicate firms exert limited market power, a portion of this power is derived from tacit price collusion. A higher degree of price collusion was found among brands within a market segment than between segments.

Suggested Citation

  • 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, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 31(01), pages 1-13, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:ags:joaaec:15137
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.15137
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/15137/files/31010001.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.15137?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Badi H. Baltagi, 2021. "Simultaneous Equations with Error Components," Springer Texts in Business and Economics, in: Econometric Analysis of Panel Data, edition 6, chapter 0, pages 157-186, Springer.
    2. Peter M. Guadagni & John D. C. Little, 1983. "A Logit Model of Brand Choice Calibrated on Scanner Data," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 2(3), pages 203-238.
    3. Garth J. Holloway, 1991. "The Farm-Retail Price Spread in an Imperfectly Competitive Food Industry," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 73(4), pages 979-989.
    4. Hausman, Jerry A & Taylor, William E, 1981. "Panel Data and Unobservable Individual Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(6), pages 1377-1398, November.
    5. Schroeter, John R, 1988. "Estimating the Degree of Market Power in the Beef Packing Industry," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 70(1), pages 158-162, February.
    6. Giancarlo Moschini, 1995. "Units of Measurement and the Stone Index in Demand System Estimation," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 77(1), pages 63-68.
    7. Kinsey, Jean D. & Senauer, Benjamin, 1997. "Food Marketing in an Electronic Age: Implications for Agriculture," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 12(2), pages 1-4.
    8. Kinal, T & Lahiri, K, 1993. "On the Estimation of Simultaneous-Equations Error-Components Models with an Application to a Model of Developing Country Foreign Trade," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 8(1), pages 81-92, Jan.-Marc.
    9. Shapiro, Carl, 1989. "Theories of oligopoly behavior," Handbook of Industrial Organization, in: R. Schmalensee & R. Willig (ed.), Handbook of Industrial Organization, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 6, pages 329-414, Elsevier.
    10. Azzeddine M. Azzam & John R. Schroeter, 1995. "The Tradeoff between Oligopsony Power and Cost Efficiency in Horizontal Consolidation: An Example from Beef Packing," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 77(4), pages 825-836.
    11. Greenhut,Melvin L. & Norman,George & Hung,Chao-Shun, 1987. "The Economics of Imperfect Competition," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521315647, September.
    12. Alok Bhargava, 2006. "Identification and Panel Data Models with Endogenous Regressors," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Econometrics, Statistics And Computational Approaches In Food And Health Sciences, chapter 3, pages 49-60, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    13. Stephen R. Koontz & Philip Garcia & Michael A. Hudson, 1993. "Meatpacker Conduct in Fed Cattle Pricing: An Investigation of Oligopsony Power," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 75(3), pages 537-548.
    14. Steven S. Vickner & Stephen P. Davies, 1998. "Comment: on the estimation of simultaneous-equations error-components models with an application to a model of developing country foreign trade," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(6), pages 671-671.
    15. Bresnahan, Timothy F., 1989. "Empirical studies of industries with market power," Handbook of Industrial Organization, in: R. Schmalensee & R. Willig (ed.), Handbook of Industrial Organization, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 17, pages 1011-1057, Elsevier.
    16. R. Schmalensee & R. Willig (ed.), 1989. "Handbook of Industrial Organization," Handbook of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 1, number 1.
    17. Appelbaum, Elie, 1982. "The estimation of the degree of oligopoly power," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2-3), pages 287-299, August.
    18. Deaton, Angus S & Muellbauer, John, 1980. "An Almost Ideal Demand System," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(3), pages 312-326, June.
    19. Greenhut,Melvin L. & Norman,George & Hung,Chao-Shun, 1987. "The Economics of Imperfect Competition," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521305525, September.
    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. Liang, Jing, 2010. "Three essays on food safety and foodborne illness," ISU General Staff Papers 201001010800002782, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    2. Manzoor Ahmad & Shehzad Khan & Zahoor Ul Haq & Shoukat Iqbal Khattak, 2024. "Measuring Market Power in the Sugar Industry of Pakistan," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 15(2), pages 5095-5120, June.
    3. Rodrigo Menon Simões Moita & Daniel Silv, 2014. "Follow The Leader: Competition In The Auto Financing Sector," Anais do XLI Encontro Nacional de Economia [Proceedings of the 41st Brazilian Economics Meeting] 136, ANPEC - Associação Nacional dos Centros de Pós-Graduação em Economia [Brazilian Association of Graduate Programs in Economics].
    4. Vickner, Steven S. & Davies, Stephen P. & Fulton, Joan R. & Vantreese, Valerie L., 2000. "Estimating Market Power And Pricing Conduct For Private-Label And National Brands In A Product-Differentiated Oligopoly: The Case Of A Frozen Vegetable Market," Journal of Food Distribution Research, Food Distribution Research Society, vol. 31(2), pages 1-13, July.
    5. Junko Kinoshita & Nobuhiro Suzuki & Harry M. Kaiser, 2002. "Explaining pricing conduct in a product-differentiated oligopolistic market: An empirical application of a price conjectural variations model," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(4), pages 427-436.
    6. Steven C. Blank & Gary D. Thompson, 2004. "Can/Should/Will A Niche Become the Norm? Organic Agriculture's Short Past and Long Future," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 22(4), pages 483-503, October.
    7. Maynard, Leigh J. & Saghaian, Sayed H. & Nickoloff, Megan, 2008. "Buyer and Seller Responses to an Adverse Food Safety Event: The Case of Frozen Salmon in Alberta," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association, vol. 11(01), pages 1-20, February.
    8. Lavoie, Nathalie, 2001. "Price Discrimination In The Context Of Vertical Differentiation: A Modeling Approach For Wheat Exports," 2001 Annual meeting, August 5-8, Chicago, IL 20603, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).

    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. Azzam, Azzeddine M., 1998. "Competition in the US meatpacking industry: is it history?," Agricultural Economics, Blackwell, vol. 18(2), pages 107-126, March.
    2. Wann, Joyce J. & Sexton, Richard J., 1991. "Imperfect Competition In Multiproduct Food Industries With Application To Pear Processing," 1991 Annual Meeting, August 4-7, Manhattan, Kansas 271370, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    3. Klaus Salhofer & Christoph Tribl & Franz Sinabell, 2012. "Market power in Austrian food retailing: the case of milk products," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 39(1), pages 109-122, February.
    4. Catherine A. Durham, 1991. "The Empirical Analysis of Oligopsony in Agricultural Markets: Residual Supply Estimation in California's Processing Tomato Market," Food Marketing Policy Center Research Reports 015, University of Connecticut, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Charles J. Zwick Center for Food and Resource Policy.
    5. Dimitrios Panagiotou & Athanassios Stavrakoudis, 2017. "A Stochastic Production Frontier Estimator of the Degree of Oligopsony Power in the U.S. Cattle Industry," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 121-133, March.
    6. Muth, Mary K. & Wohlgenant, Michael K., 1998. "A Model Of Imperfect Competition Using Marginal Input And Output Prices: Application To The Beef Packing Industry," 1998 Annual meeting, August 2-5, Salt Lake City, UT 20853, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    7. Jung Min Lee & Chanjin Chung, 2024. "Estimating Market Power Exertion in the U.S. Beef Packing Industry: An Illustration of Data Aggregation Bias Using Simulated Data," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(9), pages 1-19, April.
    8. Inbae Ji & Chanjin Chung & Jungmin Lee, 2017. "Measuring Oligopsony Power in the U.S. Cattle Procurement Market: Packer Concentration, Cattle Cycle, and Seasonality," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 33(1), pages 16-29, January.
    9. Perloff, Jeffrey M, 1991. "Econometric analysis of imperfect competition and implications for trade research," Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UC Berkeley, Working Paper Series qt46w1j22d, Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UC Berkeley.
    10. Sexton, Richard J., 1991. "Game Theory: A Review With Applications To Vertical Control In Agricultural Markets," Working Papers 225865, University of California, Davis, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
    11. Rigoberto Lopez & Azzeddine Azzam & Carmen Lirón-España, 2002. "Market Power and/or Efficiency: A Structural Approach," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 20(2), pages 115-126, March.
    12. Sexton, Richard J., 1993. "Noncooperative Game Theory: A Review with Potential Applications to Agricultural Markets," Research Reports 25183, University of Connecticut, Food Marketing Policy Center.
    13. Lopez, Rigoberto A. & Azzam, Azzeddine M. & Liron-Espana, Carmen, 2001. "Market Power and/or Efficiency: An Application to U.S. Food Processing," Research Reports 25160, University of Connecticut, Food Marketing Policy Center.
    14. Unterschultz, James R. & Jeffrey, Scott R. & Quagrainie, Kwamena K., 2000. "Value-Adding 20 Billion By 2005: Impact At The Alberta Farm Gate," Project Report Series 24049, University of Alberta, Department of Resource Economics and Environmental Sociology.
    15. Sexton, Richard J., 1994. "A Survey of Noncooperative Game Theory with Reference to Agricultural Markets: Part 2. Potential Applications in Agriculture," Review of Marketing and Agricultural Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 62(02), pages 1-18, August.
    16. Whitley John, 2002. "The Gains and Losses from Agricultural Concentration: A Critical Survey of the Literature," Journal of Agricultural & Food Industrial Organization, De Gruyter, vol. 1(1), pages 1-20, October.
    17. Deodhar, Satish Y. & Fletcher, Stanley M., 1998. "Degree Of Competition In The U.S. Peanut Butter Industry: A Dynamic Error Correction Approach," Faculty Series 16725, University of Georgia, Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics.
    18. Perekhozhuk, Oleksandr, 2007. "Marktstruktur und Preisbildung auf dem ukrainischen Markt für Rohmilch," Studies on the Agricultural and Food Sector in Transition Economies, Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), volume 41, number 92322.
    19. Fernandez-Cornejo, Jorge & Spielman, David J., 2002. "Concentration, Market Power, And Cost Efficiency In The Corn Seed Industry," 2002 Annual meeting, July 28-31, Long Beach, CA 19877, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    20. Chen, Yuquan & Yu, Xiaohua, 2018. "Does the centralized slaughtering policy create market power for pork industry in China?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 59-71.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;

    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:ags:joaaec:15137. 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: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/saeaaea.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.