IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jpolec/v117y2009i1p1-37.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does Competition Reduce Price Dispersion? New Evidence from the Airline Industry

Author

Listed:
  • Kristopher S. Gerardi
  • Adam Hale Shapiro

Abstract

We analyze the effects of competition on price dispersion in the airline industry, using panel data from 1993:Q1 through 2006:Q3. Competition has a negative effect on price dispersion, in line with the textbook treatment of price discrimination. This effect is pronounced for routes with consumers characterized by relatively heterogeneous elasticities of demand. On routes with a homogeneous customer base, the effects of competition on price dispersion are smaller. Our results contrast with those of Borenstein and Rose, who found that price dispersion increases with competition. We reconcile the different results by showing that the cross-sectional estimator suffers from omitted-variable bias. (c) 2009 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved.

Suggested Citation

  • Kristopher S. Gerardi & Adam Hale Shapiro, 2009. "Does Competition Reduce Price Dispersion? New Evidence from the Airline Industry," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 117(1), pages 1-37, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jpolec:v:117:y:2009:i:1:p:1-37
    DOI: 10.1086/597328
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/597328
    File Function: link to full text
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/597328?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. Joanna Stavins, 2001. "Price Discrimination in the Airline Market: The Effect of Market Concentration," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 83(1), pages 200-202, February.
    2. Harumi Ito & Darin Lee, 2003. "Incumbent Responses to Lower Cost Entry: Evidence from the U.S. Airline Industry," Working Papers 2003-22, Brown University, Department of Economics.
    3. Holmes, Thomas J, 1989. "The Effects of Third-Degree Price Discrimination in Oligopoly," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(1), pages 244-250, March.
    4. Brueckner, Jan K. & Spiller, Pablo T., 1991. "Competition and mergers in airline networks," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 323-342, September.
    5. Ila Alam & Leola Ross & Robin Sickles, 2001. "Time Series Analysis of Strategic Pricing Behavior in the US Airline Industry," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 16(1), pages 49-62, July.
    6. Eden, Benjamin, 1990. "Marginal Cost Pricing When Spot Markets Are Complete," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(6), pages 1293-1306, December.
    7. Kathy J. Hayes & Leola B. Ross, 1998. "Is Airline Price Dispersion the Result of Careful Planning or Competitive Forces?," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 13(5), pages 523-541, October.
    8. Lott, John R, Jr & Roberts, Russell D, 1991. "A Guide to the Pitfalls of Identifying Price Discrimination," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 29(1), pages 14-23, January.
    9. James D. Dana Jr., 1999. "Equilibrium Price Dispersion Under Demand Uncertainty: The Roles of Costly Capacity and Market Structure," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 30(4), pages 632-660, Winter.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Kristopher Gerardi & Adam Hale Shapiro, 2007. "The effects of competition on price dispersion in the airline industry: a panel analysis," Working Papers 07-7, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    2. Marco Cornia & Kristopher S. Gerardi & Adam Hale Shapiro, 2012. "Price Dispersion Over the Business Cycle: Evidence from the Airline Industry," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(3), pages 347-373, September.
    3. Angela Stefania Bergantino & Claudia Capozza, 2015. "Airline Pricing Behavior Under Limited Inter‐Modal Competition," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(1), pages 700-713, January.
    4. Bilotkach, Volodymyr & Gaggero, Alberto A. & Piga, Claudio A., 2015. "Airline pricing under different market conditions: Evidence from European Low-Cost Carriers," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 152-163.
    5. Siegert, Caspar & Ulbricht, Robert, 2020. "Dynamic oligopoly pricing: Evidence from the airline industry," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    6. Alderighi, Marco & Cento, Alessandro & Nijkamp, Peter & Rietveld, Piet, 2012. "Competition in the European aviation market: the entry of low-cost airlines," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 223-233.
    7. Ma, Wenliang & Wang, Qiang & Yang, Hangjun & Zhang, Guoquan & Zhang, Yahua, 2020. "Understanding airline price dispersion in the presence of high-speed rail," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 93-102.
    8. Alberto A. Gaggero & Claudio A. Piga, 2011. "Airline Market Power and Intertemporal Price Dispersion," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 59(4), pages 552-577, December.
    9. Bachis, Enrico & Piga, Claudio A., 2011. "Low-cost airlines and online price dispersion," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 29(6), pages 655-667.
    10. 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.
    11. Asplund, Marcus & Eriksson, Rickard & Strand, Niklas, 2001. "Price Discrimination in Oligopoly: Evidence from Swedish Newspapers," SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance 468, Stockholm School of Economics, revised 01 Jan 2007.
    12. Diego Escobari, 2013. "Asymmetric Price Adjustments in Airlines," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 34(2), pages 74-85, March.
    13. Diego Escobari, 2012. "Dynamic Pricing, Advance Sales and Aggregate Demand Learning in Airlines," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(4), pages 697-724, December.
    14. Achim I. Czerny & Anming Zhang, 2012. "Airport Congestion Pricing When Airlines Price Discriminate," WHU Working Paper Series - Economics Group 12-02, WHU - Otto Beisheim School of Management.
    15. Marc Möller & Makoto Watanabe, 2016. "Competition in the presence of individual demand uncertainty," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 47(2), pages 273-292, May.
    16. Evangelinos, Christos & Obermeyer, Andy & Püschel, Ronny, 2011. "Preisdispersion und Wettbewerb im Luftverkehr: Ein theoretischer und empirischer Überblick," Discussion Papers 2/2011, Technische Universität Dresden, "Friedrich List" Faculty of Transport and Traffic Sciences, Institute of Transport and Economics.
    17. Marco Cornia & Kristopher S. Gerardi & Adam Hale Shapiro, 2010. "Consumer Heterogeneity and Markups over the Business Cycle: Evidence from the Airline Industry," BEA Working Papers 0056, Bureau of Economic Analysis.
    18. Alderighi, Marco, 2010. "Fare dispersions in airline markets: A quantitative assessment of theoretical explanations," Journal of Air Transport Management, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 144-150.
    19. Diego Escobari & Manuel A. Hernandez, 2019. "Separating Between Unobserved Consumer Types: Evidence From Airlines," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 57(2), pages 1215-1230, April.
    20. Escobari, Diego, 2009. "Systematic peak-load pricing, congestion premia and demand diverting: Empirical evidence," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 103(1), pages 59-61, April.

    More about this item

    Lists

    This item is featured on the following reading lists, Wikipedia, or ReplicationWiki pages:
    1. Does Competition Reduce Price Dispersion? New Evidence from the Airline Industry (JPE 2009) in ReplicationWiki

    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:jpolec:v:117:y:2009:i:1:p:1-37. 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/JPE .

    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.