IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jlawec/v39y1996i2p499-517.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Is the "Dominant Firm" Dominant? An Empirical Analysis of AT&T's Market Power

Author

Listed:
  • Kahai, Simran K
  • Kaserman, David L
  • Mayo, John W

Abstract

In this article, we estimate the degree of market power held by AT&T in the interstate long-distance market in the postdivestiture period. Our approach makes use of the dominant firm/competitive fringe model to impose the structure needed both to obtain estimates of the relevant structural parameters and to translate these parameters into an estimate of AT&T's residual demand elasticity and associated Lerner index. Because of the continued presence of regulation and other considerations, however, a direct estimation of the residual demand elasticity is not feasible. Consequently, we take a more indirect approach that combines estimation of the elasticity of fringe firm supply, market demand estimation, and extant market share data to generate estimates of the desired elasticity. The resulting estimates strongly support the conclusion that AT&T lacks significant market power in the postdivestiture long-distance market. Copyright 1996 by the University of Chicago.

Suggested Citation

  • Kahai, Simran K & Kaserman, David L & Mayo, John W, 1996. "Is the "Dominant Firm" Dominant? An Empirical Analysis of AT&T's Market Power," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 39(2), pages 499-517, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jlawec:v:39:y:1996:i:2:p:499-517
    DOI: 10.1086/467357
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/467357
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/467357?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
    ---><---

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

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Saving, Thomas R, 1970. "Concentration Ratios and the Degree of Monopoly," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 11(1), pages 139-146, February.
    2. Hall, Robert E, 1988. "The Relation between Price and Marginal Cost in U.S. Industry," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 96(5), pages 921-947, October.
    3. Baker, Jonathan B. & Bresnahan, Timothy F., 1988. "Estimating the residual demand curve facing a single firm," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 6(3), pages 283-300.
    4. Gatto, Joseph P. & Langin-Hooper, Jerry & Robinson, Paul B. & Tyan, Holly, 1988. "Interstate switched access demand analysis," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 333-358.
    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. Reimer, Jeffrey J. & Steigert, Kyle W., 2006. "Imperfect Competition and Strategic Trade Theory: What Have We Learned?," Working Papers 201528, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Food System Research Group.
    2. Colucci, Domenico & Doni, Nicola & Ricchiuti, Giorgio & Valori, Vincenzo, 2022. "Market dynamics with a state-owned dominant firm and a competitive fringe," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    3. Galbi, Douglas A., 2001. "Regulating prices for shifting between service providers," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 13(4), pages 393-410, December.
    4. Zheng, Shilin & Ward, Michael R., 2011. "The effects of market liberalization and privatization on Chinese telecommunications," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 210-220, June.
    5. Kaserman, David L. & Mayo, John W., 1999. "Regulatory policies toward local exchange companies under emerging competition: guardrails or speed bumps on the information highway?," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 11(4), pages 367-388, December.
    6. J.W.B. Bos & I. Chan & J. Kolari & J. Yuan, 2009. "A Fallacy of Division: The Failure of Market Concentration as a Measure of Competition in U.S. Banking," Working Papers 09-33, Utrecht School of Economics.
    7. Stiegert, Kyle W. & Wang, Shinn-Shyr, 2003. "Imperfect Competition And Strategic Trade Theory: What Have We Learned," Working Papers 14589, International Agricultural Trade Research Consortium.
    8. Zhang, Qiong & Yang, Hangjun & Wang, Qiang & Zhang, Anming, 2014. "Market power and its determinants in the Chinese airline industry," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 1-13.
    9. Patrick Massey, 2000. "Market Definition and Market Power in Competition Analysis - Some Practical Issues," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 31(4), pages 309-328.
    10. Cory S. Capps & David Dranove & Shane Greenstein & Mark Satterthwaite, 2001. "The Silent Majority Fallacy of the Elzinga-Hogarty Criteria: A Critique and New Approach to Analyzing Hospital Mergers," NBER Working Papers 8216, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Balmer, Roberto E., 2014. "Competition and market strategies in the Swiss fixed telephony market," 20th ITS Biennial Conference, Rio de Janeiro 2014: The Net and the Internet - Emerging Markets and Policies 106837, International Telecommunications Society (ITS).
    12. Hamilton, Stephen F. & Stiegert, Kyle W., 2002. "An empirical test of the rent-shifting hypothesis: the case of state trading enterprises," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(1), pages 135-157, October.
    13. Kondaurova, Irina & Weisman, Dennis L., 2003. "Incentives for non-price discrimination," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 147-171, June.
    14. Elaine S. Tan, 2009. "Market structure and the coal cartel in early nineteenth‐century England1," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 62(2), pages 350-365, May.
    15. Antelo, Manel & Bru, Lluís, 2021. "Intrapersonal price discrimination in a dominant firm model," MPRA Paper 108412, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. White, Lawrence J., 2000. "US telephone deregulation: lessons to be learned, mistakes to be avoided," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 12(2), pages 173-183, May.
    17. Galbi, Douglas A., 2001. "Regulating prices for shifting between service providers," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 181-198, June.
    18. Reimer, Jeffrey J. & Stiegert, Kyle W., 2006. "Evidence on Imperfect Competition and Strategic Trade Theory," Staff Paper Series 498, University of Wisconsin, Agricultural and Applied Economics.
    19. John W. Mayo & David E. M. Sappington, 2016. "Regulation in a ‘Deregulated’ Industry: Railroads in the Post-Staggers Era," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 49(2), pages 203-227, September.
    20. Parsons, Steve G., 2014. "Using the Hicks formula to evaluate an estimate of the elasticity of derived demand for toll-free numbers," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 210-215.
    21. Mixon Jr., Franklin G. & Hsing, Yu, 1997. "The determinants of market share for the 'dominant firm' in telecommunications," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 309-318, December.
    22. Balmer, Roberto, 2013. "Competition and Market Strategies in the Swiss Fixed Telephony Market. An estimation of Swisscom’s dynamic residual demand curve," MPRA Paper 54078, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    23. Simran Kahai & David Kaserman, 2007. "Effective regulation versus tacit collusion in the long-distance market: an empirical analysis," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 32(3), pages 247-257, December.
    24. James Alleman & Gary Madden & Scott Savage, 2003. "Dominant carrier market power in US international telephone markets," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(6), pages 665-673.
    25. Antelo, Manel & Bru, Lluís, 2021. "Horizontal contracts in a dominant firm-competitive fringe model," MPRA Paper 105774, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    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. Sullivan, Daniel, 1989. "Monopsony Power in the Market for Nurses," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(2), pages 135-178, October.
    2. Goldberg, Pinelopi Koujianou & Knetter, Michael M., 1999. "Measuring the intensity of competition in export markets," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 27-60, February.
    3. Kenneth G. Elzinga & David E. Mills, 2011. "The Lerner Index of Monopoly Power: Origins and Uses," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 558-564, May.
    4. Zhu, Xuehong & Li, Xinyuan & Zhang, Hongwei & Huang, Jianbai, 2019. "International market power analysis of China’s tungsten export market -- from the perspective of tungsten export policies," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 643-652.
    5. James Alleman & Gary Madden & Scott Savage, 2003. "Dominant carrier market power in US international telephone markets," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(6), pages 665-673.
    6. Raper, Kellie Curry & Love, H. Alan, 1999. "MONOPSONY POWER IN MULTIPLE INPUT MARKETS: A Nonparametric Approach," Staff Paper Series 11656, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    7. Ensar Yılmaz & Zeynep Kaplan, 2022. "Heterogeneity of market power: firm-level evidence," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 55(2), pages 1207-1228, May.
    8. Kaplow, Louis & Shapiro, Carl, 2007. "Antitrust," Handbook of Law and Economics, in: A. Mitchell Polinsky & Steven Shavell (ed.), Handbook of Law and Economics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 15, pages 1073-1225, Elsevier.
    9. Blomberg, S. Brock & Hess, Gregory D., 2003. "Is the political business cycle for real?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(5-6), pages 1091-1121, May.
    10. Lukáš Čechura & Tinoush Jamali Jaghdani, 2021. "Market Imperfections within the European Wheat Value Chain: The Case of France and the United Kingdom," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-21, August.
    11. Vallés, Javier & Salas Fumás, Vicente & San Juan, Lucio, 2022. "Corporate economic profits in the euro area: The relevance of cost competitive advantage," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 569-585.
    12. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/eu4vqp9ompqllr09hc03295hg is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Sunil P. Dhoubhadel & Azzeddine M. Azzam & Matthew C. Stockton, 2017. "Does the USA have market power in importing ethanol from Brazil?," International Journal of Trade and Global Markets, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 10(2/3), pages 251-266.
    14. Alvaro Montenegro García, 2007. "Fundamentos de la política de la competencia," Documentos de Economía 3930, Universidad Javeriana - Bogotá.
    15. Jahangir Aziz & Luc Leruth, 1999. "Cyclical Effects of the Composition of Government Purchases," Macroeconomics 9902007, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Alessandro Bonanno & Rigoberto A. Lopez, 2008. "Wal-Mart’s Monopsony Power in Local Labor Markets," Food Marketing Policy Center Research Reports 103, University of Connecticut, Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Charles J. Zwick Center for Food and Resource Policy.
    17. Gual, Jordi, 2003. "Market Definition in the Telecoms Industry," CEPR Discussion Papers 3988, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. Jozef Konings & Patrick Van Cayseele & Frédéric Warzynski, 2010. "The Implementation of National Competition Policy Law and the Dynamics of Price–Cost Margins: Evidence from Belgium and the Netherlands 1993–1999," Chapters, in: Jean-Luc Gaffard & Evens Salies (ed.), Innovation, Economic Growth and the Firm, chapter 9, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    19. Stenborg, Markku, 2002. "Economics of Joint Dominance," Discussion Papers 834, The Research Institute of the Finnish Economy.
    20. Alejandro Castañeda Sabido, 2002. "Electricity, Highways and Manufacturing Growth: A Cost Based Estimate," Economía Mexicana NUEVA ÉPOCA, CIDE, División de Economía, vol. 0(1), pages 59-77, January-J.
    21. Borota Milicevic, Teodora & Carlsson, Mikael, 2016. "Markups from Inventory Data and Export Intensity," Working Paper Series 2016:9, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.

    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:ucp:jlawec:v:39:y:1996:i:2:p:499-517. 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: Journals Division (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JLE .

    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.