Search Frictions and Market Power in Negotiated-Price Markets
利用抵押贷款市场数据和搜索议价模型，分析了搜索摩擦对消费者福利的影响，并量化了搜索成本和品牌忠诚度在市场势力中的作用。
We provide a framework for empirical analysis of negotiated-price markets. Using mortgage market data and a search and negotiation model, we characterize the welfare impact of search frictions and quantify the role of search costs and brand loyalty for market power. Search frictions reduce consumer surplus by $12/month/consumer, 28% of which can be associated with discrimination, 22% with inefficient matching, and 50% with search costs. Large consumer-base banks have margins 70% higher than those with small consumer bases. The main source of this incumbency advantage is brand loyalty; however, price discrimination based on search frictions accounts for almost a third.