摘要
本文提出了一个关于企业边界的新分析框架,侧重分析产品质量声誉激励和价格竞争如何共同影响企业的边界。同一市场上具有市场势力的两家企业如果横向合并,可以减少价格竞争,增加利润。然而当消费者和企业关于产品质量存在信息不对称时,克服企业道德风险问题有赖声誉机制;横向合并在减少竞争的同时也降低了企业维持产品质量声誉的激励,其结果是企业更难获得消费者信任,最终减少利润。文章基于重复博弈模型框架从理论上研究了这两种效应的相对大小,以及成本结构、技术不确定性、贴现因子等一系列外生参数如何通过这两种效应影响企业的边界。应用上述理论,本文分析了中国经济从高速增长转向高质量发展背景下大型国有企业重组问题,尤其是横向分拆与合并决策的影响因素。由于产品质量提供中的信息不对称和道德风险,大型国有企业重组需要考虑重组对市场结构进而对产品质量和声誉机制的影响。
In this study we propose a new theory of the firm by constructing a model of repeated games with imperfect public monitoring.We focus on analyzing how reputation incentives for providing high-quality products and price competition together affect the boundaries of firms.Consider an experience product market in which firms can choose to produce a product with low effort or high effort.The cost of high effort is higher,but it is more likely to produce high-quality products.Consumers cannot observe the firm's level of effort,and only after the purchase can they observe the imperfect signals of product quality.The signals are public but unverifiable.The equilibrium of the one-shot game can only be that consumers do not trust any firm and all firms will choose low effort.If a firm is a long-run player in the market,it can maintain a reputation by choosing high effort.However,the reputation mechanism involves a trade-off between short-term and long-term benefits.The reputation mechanism only works if the firm's discount factor is greater than a certain critical level and the degree of moral hazard in production is not too high;that is,if the extra cost of high effort is not too much,the probability of producing high-quality products with high effort is high enough,or the probability of producing high-quality products with low effort is low enough.The market structure affects the possibility of the functioning of the reputation mechanism.In a duopolistic market,in contrast to a monopolistic market,a firm has stronger reputation incentives and its reputation can last longer.(a)In terms of stronger reputation incentives,a firm in a duopolistic market is more motivated to maintain a reputation;that is,the critical discount factor for the reputation mechanism in a duopolistic market is lower than in a monopolistic market.(b)In terms of a longer reputation duration,when the firm's discount factor is high such that the reputation mechanism works both in the monopolistic and duopolistic markets,a duopolistic market is still better for the reputation mechanism.In an imperfect public monitoring environment,the monopolist eventually loses its reputation in the long run due to the penalty on the equilibrium path,whereas in the duopolistic market structure,the turnover of consumers between the firms prevents the entire industry from losing its reputation completely.The decision of whether to merge needs to trade off the effects of the reputation incentive and price competition.The merging decision affects the market structure,which in turn affects the possibility of the reputation mechanism working.Assuming that two large firms are in a duopolistic competition,if they merge horizontally,the market structure becomes monopolistic.As mentioned above,maintaining a duopolistic structure provides stronger reputation incentives and a lasting reputation,which helps to maximizing profits.However,the price competition of the duopoly also harms profits.We construct a model of repeated games with imperfect public monitoring to compare the magnitude of these two effects and obtain comparative statics.This study's contribution is a new theoretical framework on the boundaries of firms.The existing reputation-based theory of the firm demonstrates the effect of reputation incentives on firm boundaries.We show how the reputation incentive effect and the price competition effect interact and jointly affect the boundaries of firms.This study provides a new way of analyzing the reorganization of China's large state-owned enterprises.Considering the context of China's economic shift from rapid growth to high-quality development,the product quality issue is increasingly important.
作者
杜创
DU Chuang(Institute of Economics,Chinese Academy of Social Sciences)
出处
《经济研究》
CSSCI
北大核心
2020年第8期153-170,共18页
Economic Research Journal
基金
国家社会科学基金重大项目(20ZDA043)的支持。
关键词
产品质量
声誉
竞争
企业边界
国有企业
Product Quality
Reputation
Competition
Boundaries of Firms
State-owned Enterprises
