TY - JOUR

T1 - The regulation of zero-price markets by the competition authorities in the USA and the EU

AU - Jarman, Stephan

AU - Karaman Örsal, Deniz Dilan

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © The Author(s) 2020.

PY - 2020/12/1

Y1 - 2020/12/1

N2 - The modern economy is flooded with products that have no monetary price. However, it is becoming something of an established fact that many zero-price products are not ‘free’ but rather incur costs for consumers in other ways. Many governments intervene in markets when consumers are not being given a fair price for their products. If the costs to consumers for some products are not monetary however, how can governments evaluate whether the costs that consumers are incurring are too high? We seek to answer this question by assessing the approaches of the US and the EU to zero-price markets as informed by their legal and ideological traditions. We offer potential policy solutions while outlining the difficulties that accompany government intervention in zero-price markets and the obstacles when it comes to measuring non-monetary forms of consumer cost.

AB - The modern economy is flooded with products that have no monetary price. However, it is becoming something of an established fact that many zero-price products are not ‘free’ but rather incur costs for consumers in other ways. Many governments intervene in markets when consumers are not being given a fair price for their products. If the costs to consumers for some products are not monetary however, how can governments evaluate whether the costs that consumers are incurring are too high? We seek to answer this question by assessing the approaches of the US and the EU to zero-price markets as informed by their legal and ideological traditions. We offer potential policy solutions while outlining the difficulties that accompany government intervention in zero-price markets and the obstacles when it comes to measuring non-monetary forms of consumer cost.

KW - Economics

KW - Zero-price markets

KW - multi-sides markets

KW - antitrust

KW - anti-competitive behaviour

KW - Google

KW - Microsoft

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85089562255&partnerID=8YFLogxK

UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/f834279b-eade-3dd0-b042-b2ed6f09ef01/

U2 - 10.1177/1783591720943756

DO - 10.1177/1783591720943756

M3 - Journal articles

VL - 21

SP - 315

EP - 343

JO - Competition and Regulation in Network Industries

JF - Competition and Regulation in Network Industries

SN - 1783-5917

IS - 4

ER -