100 Years of Rising Corporate Concentration

Spencer Y. Kwon, Yueran Ma and Kaspar Zimmermann

American Economic Review, 2024, vol. 114, issue 7, 2111-40

Abstract: We collect data on the size distribution of US businesses for 100 years, and use these data to estimate the concentration of production (e.g., asset share or sales share of top businesses). The data show that concentration has increased persistently over the past century. Rising concentration was stronger in manufacturing and mining before the 1970s, and stronger in services, retail, and wholesale after the 1970s. The results are robust to different measurement methods and consistent across different historical sources. Our findings suggest that large firms have become more important in the US economy for a long period of time.

JEL-codes: D22 E24 L11 L25 N12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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DOI: 10.1257/aer.20220621

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