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A study of the price discounts granted by Morton Salt Company and other producers of table salt in the U.S. on their sales of table salt to grocery wholesalers and retailers. The discounts were found to be illegal under the Robinson-Patman Act by the Federal Trade Commission and the Supreme Court. The Commission and the Court believed that the discounts were unjustified price concessions granted to “large” buyers, consistent with the concerns of the Robinson-Patman Act. However, the evidence indicates that the most common discount – the “carload discount” – was received by virtually all buyers, regardless of the buyer’s size; the other discounts – “annual volume” discounts – though received primarily by “large” buyers, were likely cost based. The history of the discounts and likely reasons why they were granted are explored in detail.

We propose a simple model consisting of two separated markets: the market for good y and the market for good x. Purchasing information about consumer behavior in the former market helps the monopolist firm, in the latter market, to price-discriminate. Consumers differ in their income and in their level of myopia. Personal data market regulation could both increase consumers' awareness about the treatment of their data and allow them to have their data erased from the data holder. We find that the former aspect of the policy reduces the number of transactions, and hence tends to reduce total surplus, while the second typically boosts willingness to pay of consumers and has positive effects on surplus, provided that the share of high-income consumers is not too high. The overall effect of regulation on total welfare depends on the share of high-income and myopic consumers.

How well does the “Law of One Price” operate across countries? Interest in this question has been stimulated by the Monetary Aproach to the Balance of Payments (Frenkel and Johnson (1975)) which uses the law to determine the price of traded goods in open economies.

This paper explores how the manufacturer’s strategic choice (acquisition or investment) impacts product quality in a supply chain comprising two complementary suppliers and a common manufacturer.

The manufacturer faces six strategic choices to improve product quality: acquiring or investing in the high-capable supplier, the low-capable supplier, or both. As the Stackelberg leader, the manufacturer determines which strategy is adopted, while suppliers are separately responsible for components’ quality and wholesale prices. The authors use game theory and calculate the model with Mathematica.

The authors develop analytical models to analyze how acquisition costs, investment proportions, component importance and quality improvement coefficients influence decision-makers. The results show that the highest quality may not benefit the manufacturer. Investing in or acquiring a low-capable supplier is better than a high-capable supplier under certain conditions. If the gaps between two suppliers’ quality improvement coefficients and the importance of two components are dramatic, the manufacturer should choose an investment strategy.

This study contributes to the complementary supply chain management by comparing two kinds of strategies-acquisition and investment, with a high-capable supplier and a low-capable supplier.

External factors such as improper handling, extreme weather and insect attacks affect product quality. It is most obvious in fruit products which have a high deterioration rate. Moreover, decaying fruits will increase the deteriorating of other good ones. The purpose of this study is to derive the optimal pricing and replenishment decisions for agricultural products considering the effect of external factors that induce deterioration.

In this paper, the study investigates ways to reduce the product deterioration rate by separating the near defective items from the other good products and accelerating the quick sales of the near defective items at a discounted price. The objective is to maximize the total profit by optimizing the selling price and the replenishment cycles. Two scenarios are investigated. In the first scenario, the retailer offers a selling price discount for near defective products to stimulate customer demand. In the second scenario, the retailer does not offer such discounts.

An algorithm to solve the model is derived. Further, numerical examples are developed to compare the total profit for the two scenarios. Theoretical derivations and graphical results show the concavity of the profit function. Finally, the sensitivity analysis shows that the total profit of the discount model is higher.

This study contributes to a new pricing and inventory decision model. The research provides insights to retailers on making optimal pricing and replenishment decisions for non-instantaneous deterioration items, as well as reducing the external factors that influence higher deterioration rate through separating good products from the near defective ones which are sold at a discount to induce the sale.

This paper investigates how a regulator pursuing social welfare maximization designs an optimal subsidy scheme to stimulate technology innovation in the presence of a consumer green premium. Specifically, the authors solve the following questions: (1) Does the consumers' green premium affect the design of the subsidy scheme? (2) How should the firm choose a green technology innovation strategy under the optimal subsidy scheme? (3) Does technology innovation bring higher social welfare and lower environmental impact?

The authors first develop a game model to explore the impact of subsidy schemes on social welfare without considering technology innovation. Then the authors investigate two innovation strategies, in-house innovation and external introduction, under the optimal subsidy scheme. Finally, they illustrate the optimal choices of innovation strategy for the firm, consumers and regulators.

The results reveal that the subsidy scheme will not always increase social welfare, which depends on the environmental improvement coefficient of the unit green level. The optimal subsidy level increases with the green premium, but it is not related to the size of the consumer green segment. Moreover, the success rate of in-house innovation will raise the optimal green level, but the company benefits from an increased success rate of in-house innovation only when the green segment is large enough. The green segment size and external green level jointly determine the choice of technology innovation strategy.

This research is the first to analyze this problem while considering the green demand and subsidy scheme simultaneously as drivers of a firm's technology innovation, thereby providing new managerial implications for decisions by the regulator and firms.

Many libraries have been affected by the proliferation and price inflation of serial publications in recent years. Academic libraries have been especially hard‐hit since they are trying to cope with increasing subscription prices while facing budget reductions or very small increases. Although requesting additional funds and freezing new subscriptions help as short‐term measures, some libraries have undertaken serials evaluation and cancellation programs as a more permanent solution. Our university library conducted a comprehensive serials review, which is described here. This article explains the justification for the review and describes the methodology used and the problems encountered in canceling serials subscriptions.

The main purpose of this study is to investigate product price changes from the stockholders' perspective. Our evidence indicates that stockholders react positively to a price increase at the time of the Wall Street Journal announcement. In the event of a price cut, stockholders show little reaction. In a longer interval, however, both price increases and price cuts are associated with negative stock returns. Our analysis also suggests that firms that initiate price changes experience declining sales prior to the price change decisions.

This research aims to examine the role of national culture dimensions in the nature of tier competition between high-tier brands and low-tier brands.

It starts with a conceptual framework based on prospect theory to explain the asymmetric inter-tier competition. It then describes how the national culture dimensions influence the implications of prospect theory and as a result, the nature of inter-tier competition. The paper uses Hofstede's framework to operationalize national culture and derives a number of research propositions that explicate the role of national culture in inter-tier price competition.

The study finds that the extent of asymmetry favouring high-tier brands over low-tier brands depends on the national culture dimensions. Whereas high levels of individualism, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and masculinity increase the asymmetry favouring high-tier brands, higher long-term orientation decreases asymmetric price competition favouring high-tier brands.

The findings offer important guidelines for understanding the nature of inter-tier price competition as a function of national culture.

This is the first study to extend inter-tier price competition in the global setting and also the first study that links national culture with prospect theory to examine the boundary conditions of inter-tier price competition.