Generating Evidence to Guide Merger Enforcement

Orley Ashenfelter, Daniel Hosken and Matthew Weinberg ()

No 14798, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: The challenge of effective merger enforcement is tremendous. U.S. antitrust agencies must, by statute, quickly forecast the competitive effects of mergers that occur in virtually every sector of the economy to determine if mergers can proceed. Surprisingly, given the complexity of the regulators task, there is remarkably little empirical evidence on the effects of mergers to guide regulators. This paper describes the necessity of retrospective analysis of past mergers in building an empirical basis for antitrust enforcement, and provides guidance on the key measurement issues researchers confront in estimating the price effects of mergers. We also describe how evidence from merger retrospectives can be used to evaluate the economic models used to predict the competitive effects of mergers.

JEL-codes: K21 L1 L4 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-bec, nep-com and nep-law
Note: LE PE
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (43)

Published as Orley Ashenfelter & Daniel Hosken & Matthew Weinberg, 2009. "Generating Evidence to Guide Merger Enforcement," CPI Journal, Competition Policy International, vol. 5.

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Working Paper: Generating Evidence to Guide Merger Enforcement (2009)
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