Are environmental policies counterproductive?

Environmental problems are often amplified by agglomeration of activities. We show that environmental policies may be counterproductive: by reducing polluting emissions, they reduce also the agents' disutility of pollution and increase their incentive to agglomerate. The result may be more pollution

Are environmental policies counterproductive?

Environmental problems are often amplified by agglomeration of activities. We show that environmental policies may be counterproductive: by reducing polluting emissions, they reduce also the agents' disutility of pollution and increase their incentive to agglomerate. The result may be more pollution

Quality in Open Markets: How Larger Leads to Less

We show how a large country’s entrance on world markets can lead to lower and less quality diversity available to consumers rather than more. In our model, autarky quality is directly proportional to the willingness to pay for quality and home market size, and inversely proportional to the cost of quality. We formalize strategically interacting firms, and identify the context in which a low-quality producer can lead, driving high-quality producers out of the market despite the existence of customers willing to pay for higher quality. We discuss the feasibility of this ‘predatory strategy’ by an emerging country. It is more likely in contexts where the emerging exporter is much larger

Quality in Open Markets: How Larger Leads to Less

We show how a large country’s entrance on world markets can lead to lower and less quality diversity available to consumers rather than more. In our model, autarky quality is directly proportional to the willingness to pay for quality and home market size, and inversely proportional to the cost of quality. We formalize strategically interacting firms, and identify the context in which a low-quality producer can lead, driving high-quality producers out of the market despite the existence of customers willing to pay for higher quality. We discuss the feasibility of this ‘predatory strategy’ by an emerging country. It is more likely in contexts where the emerging exporter is much larger

A model of international trade with vertical differentiation and Stackelberg leadership

This paper uses a model of international trade under duopoly to investigate under which conditions a large country’s entrance on world markets can lead to lower and less quality diversity available to consumers rather than more. In our partial model, autarky quality is proportional to the willingness to pay for quality and home market size, and inversely proportional to the cost of quality. We formalize strategically interacting firms, and identify the context in which a low-quality producer can lead, driving high-quality producers out of the market. We discuss the feasibility of this ‘predatory strategy’ by an emerging country. It is more likely in contexts where the emerging exporter is much larger and when the difference in willingness to pay for quality between countries is not too large

Quality in Open Markets: The Sumo Conjecture

We show how a large country’s entrance on world markets can lead to lower and less quality diversity available to consumers rather than more. In our model, autarky quality is directly proportional to the willingness to pay for quality and home market size, and inversely proportional to the cost of quality. We formalize strategically interacting firms, and identify the context in which a low-quality producer can lead, driving high-quality producers out of the market despite the existence of customers willing to pay for higher quality. We discuss the feasibility of this ‘predatory strategy’ by an emerging country. It is more likely in contexts where the emerging exporter is much larger