Value of an Additional Firm in Monopolistic Competition
构建了一个消费者满意度独立同分布的垄断竞争模型，利用顺序统计机制推导需求曲线，直接计算额外产品多样性的价值，并检验最优企业数量是否超过均衡数量。
The paper develops a model of monopolistic competition in which the satisfaction levels consumers get from products are independently and identically distributed. Potential substitution among products then generates demand curves through the mechanism of order statistics. The value of extra variety can be calculated directly. Pareto, lognormal and beta distributions are investigated using numerical integration. Some but not all cases support the argument that the optimal number of firms exceeds the equilibrium number.