EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Efficiencies brewed: pricing and consolidation in the US beer industry

Orley Ashenfelter, Daniel S. Hosken and Matthew C. Weinberg

RAND Journal of Economics, 2015, vol. 46, issue 2, 328-361

Abstract: type="main">

Merger efficiencies provide the primary justification for why mergers of competitors may benefit consumers. Surprisingly, there is little evidence that efficiencies can offset incentives to raise prices following mergers. We estimate the effects of increased concentration and efficiencies on pricing by using panel scanner data and geographic variation in how the merger of the brewers Miller and Coors was expected to increase concentration and reduce costs. All else equal, the average predicted increase in concentration led to price increases of 2%, but at the mean this was offset by a nearly equal and opposite efficiency effect.

Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (75)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/1756-2171.12092 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Efficiencies Brewed: Pricing and Consolidation in the U.S. Beer Industry (2013) Downloads
Working Paper: Efficiencies Brewed: Pricing and Consolidation in the US Beer Industry (2013) Downloads
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:randje:v:46:y:2015:i:2:p:328-361

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... al.asp?ref=0741-6261

Access Statistics for this article

RAND Journal of Economics is currently edited by James Hosek

More articles in RAND Journal of Economics from RAND Corporation Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-22
Handle: RePEc:bla:randje:v:46:y:2015:i:2:p:328-361