The paper analyses the effects of the 1990 Brazilian trade liberalisation on the total factor productivity, market share and profits of a sample of 318 large manufacturing firms. A panel data production function analysis for the period 1986–94 indicates very large total factor productivity gains in the period to 1994, which were accompanied by large falls in market shares and profits. The explanation advanced is that the shock of trade liberalisation to profits was so great that firms were stimulated to improve their efficiency dramatically.

No abstract

In Cournot oligopoly the efficiency of a firm relative to others determines its market share: this relationship gives an incentive to improve efficiency. The incentives are greater in markets where firm behaviour is more competitive. Components of firm efficiency are identified by frontier production function techniques in 19 UK manufacturing sectors: technical change, average efficiency of each firm relative to the frontier, and the efficiency of each firm relative to its own ‘best practice’ in each period. Short run declines in market shares and profits induce the firm to improve efficiency relative to its ‘best practice’. Long run differences in efficiency are correlated with differences in gross investment.

We develop a model of competition between shopping centers, comparing competitive outcomes in three alternative modes of retail organization, namely: streets (in which neither developers or retailers internalize agglomeration effects between products); malls (in which developers internalize); and supermarkets (in which both developers and retailers internalize). For a fixed number of centers: (i) converting streets to malls intensifies developer (but not retailer) competition, which increases product range (i.e., the number of shops built by the developers) and consumer surplus, reduces profits, and has ambiguous effects on welfare; (ii) converting streets to supermarkets intensifies retailer and developer competition, has ambiguous effects on product range (number of shops), reduces profits, and increases social welfare. With free entry both conversions reduce the number of centers and, if there is excess entry, conversion to supermarkets (but not malls) unambiguously increases welfare.

No abstract