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Supply and Demand and Market Definition

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MARKET DEFINITION AND MARKET POWER IN COMPETITION ANALYSIS The Economic and Social Review, Vol. 31, No. 4, October, 2000, pp. 309-328 309 Market Definition and Market Power in Competition Analysis: Some Practical Issues PATRICK MASSEY* Competition Authority Abstract: Market definition plays a key role in competition analysis and has often proved controversial. However, it is merely a means to an end, the real issue being to establish whether or not firms have significant market power, i.e. the power to increase prices. This objective is rather different to the traditional neo-classical economic view of a market. The introduction of the SSNIP test in the US Department of Justice 1982 Merger Guidelines resulted in the development …show more content…

2. Times-Picayune Publishing Co. v. United States, 345 US 594 (1952). 3. United States v. E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., 353 US 586 (1957). MARKET DEFINITION AND MARKET POWER IN COMPETITION ANALYSIS 311 Although Du Pont produced 85 per cent of all cellophane wrapping, the Court determined that other packaging materials were substitutes for cellophane at prevailing market prices and concluded that the relevant product market was wider than cellophane. Many commentators argued that the majority judgment made a serious error, in what has come to be referred to as the cellophane trap. A profit-maximising monopolist will generally raise price to the point where other products become close substitutes. Looking at the degree of product substitution at prevailing prices involves considering the position after the firm or firms have already raised prices. In those circumstances cross elasticities establish that the firm or firms lack the power to raise the price any further. In abuse of dominance cases, it is the cross price elasticities at the competitive price rather than at the prevailing price level that must be used to define the market. However, competitive prices cannot be observed and must be inferred. In Philadelphia National Bank the Court defined the relevant market as the four-county Philadelphia metropolitan

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