IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/canjec/v50y2017i5p1489-1524.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The rise of economics in competition policy: A Canadian perspective

Author

Listed:
  • Marcel Boyer
  • Thomas W. Ross
  • Ralph A. Winter

Abstract

Competition policy in Canada and elsewhere has changed remarkably over the last 50 years—in large measure due to advances in economics. In this article, we trace the impact of developments in industrial organization on the three central areas of competition policy: cartels, single firm conduct and mergers. We focus on Canadian competition policy but draw comparisons with developments in the United States and Europe. L’essor de l’économique dans la politique de concurrence : une perspective canadienne. La politique de concurrence s’est remarquablement transformée au cours des derniers 50 ans au Canada, en grande partie à cause des avancées en science économique. Dans ce texte, les auteurs retracent l’impact des développements en organisation industrielle sur les trois zones centrales de la politique de concurrence : les cartels, la conduite de la firme, et les fusions. On met l’accent sur la politique de concurrence canadienne, mais on esquisse des comparaisons avec des développements aux États‐Unis et en Europe.

Suggested Citation

  • Marcel Boyer & Thomas W. Ross & Ralph A. Winter, 2017. "The rise of economics in competition policy: A Canadian perspective," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 50(5), pages 1489-1524, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:canjec:v:50:y:2017:i:5:p:1489-1524
    DOI: 10.1111/caje.12305
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/caje.12305
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/caje.12305?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. Bliss, Michael, 1973. "Another Anti-Trust Tradition: Canadian Anti-Combines Policy, 1889–1910," Business History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 47(2), pages 177-188, July.
    2. Gary S. Becker, 1974. "Crime and Punishment: An Economic Approach," NBER Chapters, in: Essays in the Economics of Crime and Punishment, pages 1-54, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Oliver Budzinski & Isabel Ruhmer, 2010. "Merger Simulation In Competition Policy: A Survey," Journal of Competition Law and Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 6(2), pages 277-319.
    4. Allain, Marie-Laure & Boyer, Marcel & Kotchoni, Rachidi & Ponssard, Jean-Pierre, 2015. "Are cartel fines optimal? Theory and evidence from the European Union," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 38-47.
    5. Motta, Massimo & Polo, Michele, 2003. "Leniency programs and cartel prosecution," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 347-379, March.
    6. Dixit, Avinash, 1980. "The Role of Investment in Entry-Deterrence," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 90(357), pages 95-106, March.
    7. Steven Shavell, 1979. "Risk Sharing and Incentives in the Principal and Agent Relationship," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(1), pages 55-73, Spring.
    8. Bosch, Jean-Claude & Eckard, E Woodrow, Jr, 1991. "The Profitability of Price Fixing: Evidence from Stock Market Reaction to Federal Indictments," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 73(2), pages 309-317, May.
    9. Ralph A. Winter, 2009. "Presidential Address: Antitrust restrictions on single-firm strategies," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 42(4), pages 1207-1239, November.
    10. Giancarlo Spagnolo, 2004. "Divide et Impera. Optimnal Deterrence Mechanisms Against Cartels and Organized Crime," Econometric Society 2004 North American Winter Meetings 485, Econometric Society.
    11. Marvel, Howard P, 1982. "Exclusive Dealing," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 25(1), pages 1-25, April.
    12. Marcel Boyer & Tracy R. Lewis & Wei Lin Liu, 2000. "Setting standards for credible compliance and law enforcement," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 33(2), pages 319-340, May.
    13. Marcel Boyer & Rachidi Kotchoni, 2015. "How Much Do Cartel Overcharge?," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 47(2), pages 119-153, September.
    14. Ippolito, Pauline M, 1991. "Resale Price Maintenance: Empirical Evidence from Litigation," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(2), pages 263-294, October.
    15. Donald McFetridge, 1998. "Merger Enforcement under the Competition Act after Ten Years," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 13(1), pages 25-56, April.
    16. Ralph A. Winter, 1993. "Vertical Control and Price Versus Nonprice Competition," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(1), pages 61-76.
    17. Philip Crooke & Luke Froeb & Steven Tschantz & Gregory Werden, 1999. "Effects of Assumed Demand Form on Simulated Postmerger Equilibria," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 15(3), pages 205-217, November.
    18. John Thompson & David Kaserman, 2001. "After The Fall: Stock Price Movements and the Deterrent Effect of Antitrust Enforcement," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 19(3), pages 329-334, November.
    19. Michael D. Whinston & Ilya R. Segal, 2000. "Naked Exclusion: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(1), pages 296-309, March.
    20. Marie-Laure Allain & Marcel Boyer & Jean-Pierre Ponssard, 2011. "The determination of optimal fines in cartel cases: Theory and practice," Post-Print hal-00643945, HAL.
    21. Chen, Zhiqi & Ghosh, Subhadip & Ross, Thomas W., 2015. "Denying leniency to cartel instigators: Costs and benefits," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 19-29.
    22. Bengt Holmstrom, 1979. "Moral Hazard and Observability," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(1), pages 74-91, Spring.
    23. Günster, Andrea & van Dijk, Mathijs, 2016. "The impact of European antitrust policy: Evidence from the stock market," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 20-33.
    24. Marie-Laure Allain & Marcel Boyer & Jean-Pierre Ponssard & Rachidi Kotchoni, 2011. "The Determination of Optimal Fines in Cartel Cases - The Myth of Underdeterrence," CIRANO Working Papers 2011s-34, CIRANO.
    25. Patrick Rey & Thibaud Vergé, 2010. "Resale Price Maintenance And Interlocking Relationships," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(4), pages 928-961, December.
    26. Luca Aguzzoni & Gregor Langus & Massimo Motta, 2013. "The Effect of EU Antitrust Investigations and Fines on a Firm's Valuation," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 61(2), pages 290-338, June.
    27. G.F. Mathewson & R.A. Winter, 1984. "An Economic Theory of Vertical Restraints," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(1), pages 27-38, Spring.
    28. Klein, Benjamin & Murphy, Kevin M, 1988. "Vertical Restraints as Contract Enforcement Mechanisms," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 31(2), pages 265-297, October.
    29. Rey, Patrick & Tirole, Jean, 1986. "The Logic of Vertical Restraints," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(5), pages 921-939, December.
    30. John Asker & Heski Bar-Isaac, 2014. "Raising Retailers' Profits: On Vertical Practices and the Exclusion of Rivals," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(2), pages 672-686, February.
    31. Thomas Ross, 1998. "Introduction: The Evolution of Competition Law in Canada," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 13(1), pages 1-23, April.
    32. Bruno Jullien & Patrick Rey, 2007. "Resale price maintenance and collusion," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 38(4), pages 983-1001, December.
    33. Joseph E. Harrington, 2008. "Optimal Corporate Leniency Programs," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 56(2), pages 215-246, June.
    34. Storli, Espen, 2014. "Cartel Theory and Cartel Practice: The Case of the International Aluminum Cartels, 1901–1940," Business History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 88(3), pages 445-467, October.
    35. Aghion, Philippe & Bolton, Patrick, 1987. "Contracts as a Barrier to Entry," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(3), pages 388-401, June.
    36. Joskow, Paul L, 1987. "Contract Duration and Relationship-Specific Investments: Empirical Evidence from Coal Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(1), pages 168-185, March.
    37. Ilya Segal & Michael D. Whinston, 2000. "Exclusive Contracts and Protection of Investments," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 31(4), pages 603-633, Winter.
    38. Tom Ross, 1991. "Proposals for a New Canadian Competition Law on Conspiracy," Carleton Industrial Organization Research Unit (CIORU) 91-01, Carleton University, Department of Economics.
    39. Paul Klemperer, 1987. "The Competitiveness of Markets with Switching Costs," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 18(1), pages 138-150, Spring.
    40. Louis Kaplow & Steven Shavell, 2001. "Any Non-welfarist Method of Policy Assessment Violates the Pareto Principle," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 109(2), pages 281-286, April.
    41. Marcel Boyer & Rachidi Kotchoni, 2015. "How Much Do Cartel Overcharge? (The "Working Paper" Version)," CIRANO Working Papers 2015s-37, CIRANO.
    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. Marcel Boyer & Anne Catherine Faye & Éric Gravel & Rachidi Kotchoni, 2019. "Guiding Principles in Setting Cartel Sanctions (The Working Paper Version)," CIRANO Working Papers 2019s-18, CIRANO.
    2. Kargas, Antonios & Argyroulis, Vasileios & Varoutas, Dimitrios, 2023. "Mergers and acquisitions in telecommunications market: a simultaneous equations approach to study Structure, Conduct and Performance," 32nd European Regional ITS Conference, Madrid 2023: Realising the digital decade in the European Union – Easier said than done? 277984, International Telecommunications Society (ITS).
    3. Boyer, Marcel & Faye, Anne Catherine & Kotchoni, Rachidi, 2017. "Challenges and Pitfalls in Cartel Policy and Fining," TSE Working Papers 17-852, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    4. Thomas W. Ross & Ralph A. Winter, 2021. "A Canadian Perspective on Vertical Merger Policy and Guidelines," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 59(2), pages 229-253, September.

    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. Ralph A. Winter, 2009. "Presidential Address: Antitrust restrictions on single-firm strategies," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 42(4), pages 1207-1239, November.
    2. Allain, Marie-Laure & Boyer, Marcel & Kotchoni, Rachidi & Ponssard, Jean-Pierre, 2015. "Are cartel fines optimal? Theory and evidence from the European Union," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 38-47.
    3. Hiroshi Kitamura & Noriaki Matsushima & Misato Sato, 2024. "How Does Downstream Firms’ Efficiency Affect Exclusive Supply Agreements?," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 64(2), pages 219-242, March.
    4. Bakó, Barna & Kálecz-Simon, András, 2012. "Vertikális korlátozások - növelik vagy csökkentik a jólétet?. Érvek az irodalomból [Vertical constraints - do they increase or reduce welfare?. Arguments in the literature]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(10), pages 1138-1159.
    5. Kitamura, Hiroshi & Matsushima, Noriaki & Sato, Misato, 2018. "Exclusive contracts with complementary inputs," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 145-167.
    6. repec:dpr:wpaper:0918 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Dertwinkel-Kalt, Markus & Wey, Christian, 2023. "Resale price maintenance in a successive monopoly model," DICE Discussion Papers 395, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE).
    8. John Asker & Heski Bar-Isaac, 2010. "Exclusionary Minimum Resale Price Maintenance," NBER Working Papers 16564, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Ingene, Charles A. & Parry, Mark E. & Xu, Zibin, 2020. "Resale Price Maintenance: Customer Service Without Free Riding," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 96(4), pages 563-577.
    10. Chen, Chia-Wen, 2014. "Estimating the foreclosure effect of exclusive dealing: Evidence from the entry of specialty beer producers," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 47-64.
    11. Katsoulacos, Yannis & Motchenkova, Evgenia & Ulph, David, 2015. "Penalizing cartels: The case for basing penalties on price overcharge," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 70-80.
    12. Dertwinkel-Kalt, Markus & Wey, Christian, 2021. "Multi-Product Pricing and Minimum Resale Price Maintenance," VfS Annual Conference 2021 (Virtual Conference): Climate Economics 242338, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    13. Ulsaker, Simen A., 2020. "Competing buyers, rent extraction and inefficient exclusion," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    14. Marcel Boyer & Anne Catherine Faye & Rachidi Kotchoni, 2017. "Challenges and Pitfalls in Cartel Policy and Fining," CIRANO Working Papers 2017s-20, CIRANO.
    15. Belleflamme,Paul & Peitz,Martin, 2015. "Industrial Organization," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107687899.
    16. Yannis Katsoulacos & Evgenia Motchenkova & David Ulph, 2020. "Penalising on the Basis of the Severity of the Offence: A Sophisticated Revenue-Based Cartel Penalty," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 57(3), pages 627-646, November.
    17. Marcel Boyer & Anne Catherine Faye & Éric Gravel & Rachidi Kotchoni, 2019. "Guiding Principles in Setting Cartel Sanctions (The Working Paper Version)," CIRANO Working Papers 2019s-18, CIRANO.
    18. Holler, Emanuel & Rickert, Dennis, 2022. "How resale price maintenance and loss leading affect upstream cartel stability: Anatomy of a coffee cartel," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    19. Foros, Øystein & Kind, Hans Jarle & Shaffer, Greg, 2015. "Apple's Agency Model and the Role of Resale Price Maintenance," Discussion Papers 2015/32, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Business and Management Science.
    20. Ran Jing & Jiong Gong & Fang Yi, 2020. "Antitrust Fines: Experiences from China," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 57(1), pages 167-187, August.
    21. Bogdan Genchev & Julie Holland Mortimer, 2016. "Empirical Evidence on Conditional Pricing Practices," NBER Working Papers 22313, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • L40 - Industrial Organization - - Antitrust Issues and Policies - - - General
    • L41 - Industrial Organization - - Antitrust Issues and Policies - - - Monopolization; Horizontal Anticompetitive Practices
    • K21 - Law and Economics - - Regulation and Business Law - - - Antitrust Law

    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:wly:canjec:v:50:y:2017:i:5:p:1489-1524. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1111/(ISSN)1540-5982 .

    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.