IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/jincot/v17y2017i1d10.1007_s10842-016-0233-0.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Stochastic Production Frontier Estimator of the Degree of Oligopsony Power in the U.S. Cattle Industry

Author

Listed:
  • Dimitrios Panagiotou

    (University of Ioannina)

  • Athanassios Stavrakoudis

    (University of Ioannina)

Abstract

The objective of this study is to estimate the degree of oligopsony power in the U.S. cattle industry with the use of the recently developed stochastic frontier estimator of market power. Unlike the seminal paper where estimation of the mark-up in an output market at firm level was the main objective, this work proposes a stochastic production frontier estimator in order to estimate the mark-down in an input market at aggregate level. Furthermore, with the help of the new estimator we derive and estimate the Lerner index of oligospony power for the U.S. cattle market. For the empirical part of the study we employed annual time series data from the U.S. cattle/beef industry for the time period 1970-2009. Our results suggest that beef packers exert market power when purchasing live cattle for slaughter.

Suggested Citation

  • 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.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jincot:v:17:y:2017:i:1:d:10.1007_s10842-016-0233-0
    DOI: 10.1007/s10842-016-0233-0
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10842-016-0233-0
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10842-016-0233-0?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 look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. A. M. Azzam & E. Pagoulatos, 1990. "Testing Oligopolistic And Oligopsonistic Behaviour: An Application To The Us Meat‐Packing Industry," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(3), pages 362-370, September.
    2. Richard J. Sexton, 2000. "Industrialization and Consolidation in the U.S. Food Sector: Implications for Competition and Welfare," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 82(5), pages 1087-1104.
    3. 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.
    4. Azzam, Azzeddine M. & Schroeter, John R., 1991. "Implications Of Increased Regional Concentration And Oligopsonistic Coordination In The Beef Packing Industry," Western Journal of Agricultural Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 16(2), pages 1-8, December.
    5. Azzeddine Azzam, 1996. "Estimating the degree of dominance in a bilateral oligopoly," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 3(4), pages 209-211.
    6. repec:bla:jindec:v:45:y:1997:i:4:p:377-86 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. 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.
    8. Subal Kumbhakar & Sjur Baardsen & Gudbrand Lien, 2012. "A New Method for Estimating Market Power with an Application to Norwegian Sawmilling," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 40(2), pages 109-129, March.
    9. Xiaowei Cai & Kyle Stiegert & Stephen Koontz, 2011. "Regime switching and oligopsony power: the case of U.S. beef processing," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 42(1), pages 99-109, January.
    10. Cai, Xiaowei & Stiegert, Kyle W. & Koontz, Stephen R., 2009. "Oligopsony Power: Evidence from the U.S. Beef Packing Industry," 2009 Annual Meeting, July 26-28, 2009, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 49364, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    11. Lopez, Rigoberto A. & Zheng, Hualu & Azzam, Azzeddine, 2015. "Oligopoly Power in the Food Industries Revisited: A Stochastic Frontier Approach," Working Paper series 290114, University of Connecticut, Charles J. Zwick Center for Food and Resource Policy.
    12. 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.
    13. Appelbaum, Elie, 1982. "The estimation of the degree of oligopoly power," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2-3), pages 287-299, August.
    14. MacDonald, James M. & McBride, William D., 2009. "The Transformation of U.S. Livestock Agriculture: Scale, Efficiency, and Risks," Economic Information Bulletin 58311, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    15. Dimitrios Panagiotou & Azzeddine M. Azzam, 2010. "Trade Bans, Imperfect Competition, and Welfare: BSE and the U.S. Beef Industry," Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics/Revue canadienne d'agroeconomie, Canadian Agricultural Economics Society/Societe canadienne d'agroeconomie, vol. 58(1), pages 109-129, March.
    16. Schroeter, John R. & Azzam, Azzeddine M., 1990. "Measuring Market Power in Multi-Product Oligopolies: The U.S. Meat Industry," Staff General Research Papers Archive 11112, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    17. Subir Bairagi & Azzeddine Azzam, 2014. "Does the Grameen Bank exert market power over borrowers?," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(12), pages 866-869, August.
    18. 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.
    19. Kyle W. Stiegert & Azzeddine Azzam & B. Wade Brorsen, 1993. "Markdown Pricing and Cattle Supply in the Beef Packing Industry," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 75(3), pages 549-558.
    20. Michael K. Wohlgenant, 1989. "Demand for Farm Output in a Complete System of Demand Functions," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 71(2), pages 241-252.
    21. Hunnicutt Lynn & Aadland David, 2003. "Inventory Constraints in a Dynamic Model of Imperfect Competition: An Application to Beef Packing," Journal of Agricultural & Food Industrial Organization, De Gruyter, vol. 1(1), pages 1-24, March.
    22. Koontz, Stephen R. & Garcia, Philip, 1997. "Meat-Packer Conduct In Fed Cattle Pricing: Multiple-Market Oligopsony Power," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 22(1), pages 1-17, July.
    23. Subhash Ray, 1999. "Measuring Scale Efficiency from a Translog Production Function," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 11(2), pages 183-194, April.
    24. Ward, Clement E., 2010. "Assessing Competition in the U.S. Beef Packing Industry," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 25(2), pages 1-14.
    25. Azzeddine M. Azzam, 1997. "Measuring Market Power and Cost‐efficiency Effects of Industrial Concentration," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(4), pages 377-386, December.
    26. Kumbhakar,Subal C. & Lovell,C. A. Knox, 2003. "Stochastic Frontier Analysis," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521666633, November.
    27. Azzeddine Azzam, 1998. "Captive Supplies, Market Conduct, and the Open-Market Price," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 80(1), pages 76-83.
    28. Panagiotou, Dimitrios, 2005. "Cointegration, Error Correction, And The Measurement Of Oligopsony Conduct In The U.S. Cattle Market," 2005 Annual meeting, July 24-27, Providence, RI 19201, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    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. Dimitrios Panagiotou, 2019. "Market Power Effects of the Livestock Mandatory Reporting Act in the U.S. Meat Industry: a Stochastic Frontier Approach Under Uncertainty," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 103-122, March.
    2. Panagiotou, Dimitrios, 2017. "What does the stochastic frontier estimator of market power really account for? A theoretical analysis with references from the food industry," Agricultural Economics Review, Greek Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 0(Issue 2), July.
    3. Dimitrios Panagiotou & Athanassios Stavrakoudis, 2018. "A stochastic frontier estimator of the aggregate degree of market power exerted by the US meat packing industry," Economia e Politica Industriale: Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, Springer;Associazione Amici di Economia e Politica Industriale, vol. 45(3), pages 387-401, September.
    4. Maximilian Koppenberg & Stefan Hirsch, 2022. "Output market power and firm characteristics in dairy processing: Evidence from three EU countries," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 73(2), pages 490-517, June.
    5. Dimitrios Panagiotou & Athanassios Stavrakoudis, 2020. "A Stochastic Frontier Analysis Approach for Estimating Market Power in the Major US Meat Export Markets," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 569-586, September.
    6. Rao Fu & Chenguang Li & Liming Wang, 2021. "Market Power in the Irish Beef Processing Industry," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-18, 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. Azzam, Azzeddine M., 1998. "Competition in the US meatpacking industry: is it history?," Agricultural Economics, Blackwell, vol. 18(2), pages 107-126, March.
    2. 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.
    3. Cai, Xiaowei & Stiegert, Kyle W. & Koontz, Stephen R., 2009. "Oligopsony Power: Evidence from the U.S. Beef Packing Industry," 2009 Annual Meeting, July 26-28, 2009, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 49364, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    4. Stavrakoudis, Athanassios & Panagiotou, Dimitrios, 2016. "A stochastic frontier estimator of the aggregate degree of market power exerted by the U.S. beef and pork packing industries," MPRA Paper 75997, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. 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.
    6. Dimitrios Panagiotou & Athanassios Stavrakoudis, 2018. "A stochastic frontier estimator of the aggregate degree of market power exerted by the US meat packing industry," Economia e Politica Industriale: Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, Springer;Associazione Amici di Economia e Politica Industriale, vol. 45(3), pages 387-401, September.
    7. Oleksandr Perekhozhuk, 2013. "Modern Concepts for Pricing Analysis in Imperfect Competition Production Factor Market," Oblik i finansi, Institute of Accounting and Finance, issue 4, pages 99-106, December.
    8. 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).
    9. Perekhozhuk, Oleksandr, 2013. "Moderne Konzepte zur Analyse der Preisbildung auf dem Faktormarkt mit unvollständigem Wettbewerb," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, issue 4, pages 99-106.
    10. Maes, Dries & Vancauteren, Mark & Van Passel, Steven, 2019. "Investigating market power in the Belgian pork production chain," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), vol. 100(1-4), November.
    11. Rahman, Mohammad Chhiddikur, 2020. "Welfare Impact of Asymmetric Price Transmission on Bangladesh Rice Consumers," EconStor Theses, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, number 242248, June.
    12. Steiner, Bodo E., 2007. "Formal beef alliances and alignment challenges: issues in contracting, pricing and quality," Project Report Series 7709, University of Alberta, Department of Resource Economics and Environmental Sociology.
    13. Maes, Dries & Vancauteren, Mark & Van Passel, Steven, 2016. "Investigating market power in the Belgian pork production chain," 149th Seminar, October 27-28, 2016, Rennes, France 245114, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    14. Dries Maes & Mark Vancauteren & Steven Passel, 2019. "Investigating market power in the Belgian pork production chain," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, Springer, vol. 100(1), pages 93-117, December.
    15. Dries Maes & Mark Vancauteren & Steven Van Passel, 2019. "Investigating market power in the Belgian porkproduction chain," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, INRA Department of Economics, vol. 100(1-4), pages 93-117.
    16. 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.
    17. Alessandro Bonanno & Carlo Russo & Luisa Menapace, 2018. "Market power and bargaining in agrifood markets: A review of emerging topics and tools," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 34(1), pages 6-23, December.
    18. Ian Sheldon & Richard Sperling, 2003. "Estimating the Extent of Imperfect Competition in the Food Industry: What Have We Learned?," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(1), pages 89-109, March.
    19. Ronchi, Loraine, 2006. "Fairtrade and market failures in agricultural commodity markets," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4011, The World Bank.
    20. Rao Fu & Chenguang Li & Liming Wang, 2021. "Market Power in the Irish Beef Processing Industry," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-18, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Cattle; Stochastic frontier analysis; Oligopsony; Market power;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q11 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Aggregate Supply and Demand Analysis; Prices
    • C13 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Estimation: General
    • L66 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Manufacturing - - - Food; Beverages; Cosmetics; Tobacco

    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:kap:jincot:v:17:y:2017:i:1:d:10.1007_s10842-016-0233-0. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://springer.com .

    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.