IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/zbw/ifweej/5580.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Pricing Damaged Goods

Author

Listed:
  • McAfee, R. Preston

Abstract

Companies with market power occasionally engage in intentional quality reduction of a portion of their output as a means of offering two qualities of goods for the purpose of price discrimination, even absent a cost saving. This paper provides an exact characterization in terms of marginal revenues of when such a strategy is profitable, which, remarkably, does not depend on the distribution of customer valuations, but only on the value of the damaged product relative to the undamaged product. In particular, when the damaged product provides a constant proportion of the value of the full product, selling a damaged good is unprofitable. One quality reduction produces higher profits than another if the former has higher marginal revenue than the latter.

Suggested Citation

  • McAfee, R. Preston, 2007. "Pricing Damaged Goods," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 1, pages 1-19.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:ifweej:5580
    DOI: 10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2007-1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2007-1
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/17999/1/economics_2007-1.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2007-1?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
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Justin P. Johnson & David P. Myatt, 2003. "Multiproduct Quality Competition: Fighting Brands and Product Line Pruning," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(3), pages 748-774, June.
    2. Armstrong, Mark & Vickers, John, 2001. "Competitive Price Discrimination," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 32(4), pages 579-605, Winter.
    3. Motta, Massimo, 1993. "Endogenous Quality Choice: Price vs. Quantity Competition," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(2), pages 113-131, June.
    4. Justin P. Johnson & David P. Myatt, 2006. "Multiproduct Cournot oligopoly," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 37(3), pages 583-601, September.
    5. Jong‐Hee Hahn, 2006. "Damaged durable goods," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 37(1), pages 121-133, March.
    6. Jong-Hee Hahn, 2006. "Damaged Durable Goods," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 37(1), pages 121-133, Spring.
    7. Mussa, Michael & Rosen, Sherwin, 1978. "Monopoly and product quality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 301-317, August.
    8. Jing, Bing, 2007. "Network externalities and market segmentation in a monopoly," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 95(1), pages 7-13, April.
    9. Armstrong, Mark, 1996. "Multiproduct Nonlinear Pricing," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(1), pages 51-75, January.
    10. Varian, Hal R, 1985. "Price Discrimination and Social Welfare," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 75(4), pages 870-875, September.
    11. Srinagesh, Padmanabhan & Bradburd, Ralph M, 1989. "Quality Distortion by a Discriminating Monopolist," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(1), pages 96-105, March.
    12. Raymond J. Deneckere & R. Preston McAfee, 1996. "Damaged Goods," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 5(2), pages 149-174, June.
    13. Eric T. Anderson & James D. Dana, Jr., 2009. "When Is Price Discrimination Profitable?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 55(6), pages 980-989, June.
    14. Besanko, David & Donnenfeld, Shabtai & White, Lawrence J, 1988. "The Multiproduct Firm, Quality Choice, and Regulation," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(4), pages 411-429, June.
    15. Kim, Jong Seok, 1987. "Optimal Price-Quality Schedules and Sustainability," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(2), pages 231-244, December.
    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. Belleflamme,Paul & Peitz,Martin, 2015. "Industrial Organization," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107687899, June.
    2. Costis Maglaras & John Yao & Assaf Zeevi, 2018. "Optimal Price and Delay Differentiation in Large-Scale Queueing Systems," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(5), pages 2427-2444, May.
    3. Carlotta Mariotto & Marianne Verdier, 2020. "Platform–merchant competition for sales services," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(4), pages 834-853, October.
    4. Roy Jones & Haim Mendelson, 2011. "Information Goods vs. Industrial Goods: Cost Structure and Competition," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 57(1), pages 164-176, January.
    5. McCalman, Phillip, 2010. "Trade policy in a "super size me" world," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 206-218, July.
    6. Philipp Afèche & J. Michael Pavlin, 2016. "Optimal Price/Lead-Time Menus for Queues with Customer Choice: Segmentation, Pooling, and Strategic Delay," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(8), pages 2412-2436, August.
    7. Lachapelle, A. & Santambrogio, F., 2011. "On the strategic use of risk and undesirable goods in multidimensional screening," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(6), pages 698-705.
    8. Turunç Ömer & Karayalçın Cem, 2024. "Bridging Brand Parity with Insights Regarding Consumer Behavior," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 18(1), pages 1-10, January.
    9. Eric T. Anderson & James D. Dana, Jr., 2009. "When Is Price Discrimination Profitable?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 55(6), pages 980-989, June.

    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. Mark Armstrong, 2016. "Nonlinear Pricing," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 8(1), pages 583-614, October.
    2. Anderson, Simon P. & Celik, Levent, 2015. "Product line design," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 517-526.
    3. Belleflamme,Paul & Peitz,Martin, 2015. "Industrial Organization," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107687899, June.
    4. Justin P. Johnson & David P. Myatt, 2018. "The determinants of product lines," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 49(3), pages 541-573, September.
    5. José A. Novo‐Peteiro, 2023. "Product design with attribute dependence," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 91(4), pages 361-385, July.
    6. Francisco Martínez-Sánchez, 2016. "Versioning Goods and Joint Purchase: Substitution and Complementarity Strategies," Prague Economic Papers, Prague University of Economics and Business, vol. 2016(5), pages 577-590.
    7. Fischer, Carolyn, 2005. "On the importance of the supply side in demand-side management," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 165-180, January.
    8. Eric T. Anderson & James D. Dana, Jr., 2009. "When Is Price Discrimination Profitable?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 55(6), pages 980-989, June.
    9. Jian Shen & Huanxing Yang & Lixin Ye, 2016. "Competitive Nonlinear Pricing and Contract Variety," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 64(1), pages 64-108, March.
    10. Sato, Susumu, 2019. "Freemium as optimal menu pricing," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 480-510.
    11. Arup Daripa & Sandeep Kapur, 2001. "Pricing on the Internet," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 17(2), pages 202-216, Summer.
    12. Johnson, Justin P. & Myatt, David P., 2015. "The properties of product line prices," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 182-188.
    13. Sun, Ching-jen, 2007. "Dynamic Price Discrimination and Quality Provision Based on Purchase History," MPRA Paper 9855, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Aug 2008.
    14. Stole, Lars A., 2007. "Price Discrimination and Competition," Handbook of Industrial Organization, in: Mark Armstrong & Robert Porter (ed.), Handbook of Industrial Organization, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 34, pages 2221-2299, Elsevier.
    15. Soheil Ghili & Russ Yoon, 2023. "An Empirical Analysis of Optimal Nonlinear Pricing in Business-to-Business Markets," Papers 2302.11643, arXiv.org, revised Aug 2024.
    16. Yi-Ling Cheng & Shin-Kun Peng, 2012. "Quality and Quantity Competition in a Multiproduct Duopoly," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 79(1), pages 180-202, July.
    17. Gergely Csorba & Jong‐Hee Hahn, 2006. "Functional Degradation And Asymmetric Network Effects," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(2), pages 253-268, June.
    18. Yao Luo & Isabelle Perrigne & Quang Vuong, 2018. "Structural Analysis of Nonlinear Pricing," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 126(6), pages 2523-2568.
    19. Spurlock, C. Anna & Fujita, K. Sydny, 2022. "Equity implications of market structure and appliance energy efficiency regulation," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 165(C).
    20. Inderst, Roman, 2004. "Contractual distortions in a market with frictions," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 155-176, May.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D43 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Oligopoly and Other Forms of Market Imperfection
    • L15 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Information and Product Quality

    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:zbw:ifweej:5580. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iwkiede.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.