
doi: 10.2307/2555810
Firms sometimes agree to limit the discounts they offer a class of customers, i.e., they collude on the price differences across consumer classes. Why? Courts have struck down agreements to limit discounts as violations of the laws against price-fixing. Are these collusive agreements in fact efficient? This article addresses these questions in a multiproduct duopoly model. Under one interpretation, the incentive to collude on relative prices can be traced to heterogeneity in consumers' time costs. Under fairly general conditions, total surplus increases with the collusion. This efficiency effect is most striking in the case where collusion raises the prices faced by all consumers over which firms compete.
| selected citations These citations are derived from selected sources. This is an alternative to the "Influence" indicator, which also reflects the overall/total impact of an article in the research community at large, based on the underlying citation network (diachronically). | 18 | |
| popularity This indicator reflects the "current" impact/attention (the "hype") of an article in the research community at large, based on the underlying citation network. | Top 10% | |
| influence This indicator reflects the overall/total impact of an article in the research community at large, based on the underlying citation network (diachronically). | Top 10% | |
| impulse This indicator reflects the initial momentum of an article directly after its publication, based on the underlying citation network. | Average |
