Pricing behavior and verticle contracts in retail markets
综述了零售汽油市场中企业定价行为与纵向合约的实证研究，探讨了市场势力、寡头竞争及合约形式对价格和竞争的影响，对产业组织学者和反垄断政策制定者有参考价值。
Recent developments in the economic theory of multifirm markets and firm organization have motivated several empirical studies of retail gasoline markets. A growing body of theoretical work suggests that the behavior of firms in markets once viewed as workably can diverge significantly from that characteristic of competitive markets. Static models of free-entry markets where firms are horizontally differentiated suggest that the equilibrium price structure will reflect local market power. Dynamic oligopoly models suggest that repeated interaction can sustain (tacitly) collusive outcomes in multifirm industries. Because gasoline stations are strikingly simple firms, and data are available on wholesale and retail gasoline prices, this market has proven to be a useful arena for testing pricing predictions from these models. These tests are discussed in Section I. Another growth area in industrial organization is research on the nature of vertical contracts. This work suggests that the optimal contract between a manufacturer and a retailer will be sensitive to the nature of downstream competition and the available control technology. Imperfect competition downstream can lead to double marginalization, and imperfect monitoring can allow shirking or free riding. The manufacturer can be expected to choose contractual forms that minimize these effects. Section II discusses efforts to assess the effect of competition and monitoring on the refiner's choice of contractual form for retail outlets. While examining contractual form is interesting in itself, policy initiatives provide additional impetus for examining contracts in gasoline retailing. Refiners have long been a favorite target of antitrust enforcement, and complaints regarding restraints imposed on retailers have been viewed sympathetically by the courts. Court decisions have made unlawful exclusive dealing clauses for gasoline and automotive products as well as the various arrangements through which a refiner can control the retail price at franchise outlets. In the last decade, federal and state governments have enacted legislation further restricting the nature of the contract between refiners and the retail outlets for their gasoline. The growth in these restrictions naturally leads to positive questions about the nature and effect of contractual relationships between refiners and dealers.