Competition Law Enforcement and Household Inequality in the United Kingdom

The UK’s Wealth Distribution and Characteristics of High-Wealth Households

Christopher Decker, Amit Zac, Carola Casti, Amédée von Moltke and Ariel Ezrachi

Journal of Competition Law and Economics, 2022, vol. 18, issue 4, 922-952

Abstract: Using a comprehensive database of all the decisions made under European and U.K. competition laws over the 15-year period to 2020, alongside households’ consumption and market data, we estimate the level and distribution of the savings from enforcement across the United Kingdom. We find that competition law enforcement generated greater proportional savings for lower- and average-income households relative to the wealthiest households. Our estimations indicate average savings of 2.5 percent of the annual household budget for the lowest-income households, 2.1 percent for the average household, and 1.8 percent for the highest-income household. While proportionally greater savings for lower- and average-income households from competition law are observed in most years, in some years, higher-income households saved more. Our results bring to light the variables that affect the distribution of savings. Among them are the enforcement tool applied, the sectors in which enforcement action took place, and the enforcement body. We further illustrate how the public enforcement of competition law affects economic disparity and could potentially be used in a more structured, transparent, and systematic way to address societal concerns about increasing inequality.

Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/joclec/nhac006 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
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:oup:jcomle:v:18:y:2022:i:4:p:922-952.

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Competition Law and Economics is currently edited by Nicholas Economides, Amelia Fletcher, Michal Gal, Damien Geradin, Ioannis Lianos and Tommaso Valletti

More articles in Journal of Competition Law and Economics from Oxford University Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().