Effects of Mergers and Acquisitions
Paper Session
Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025 10:15 AM - 12:15 PM (PST)
- Chair: Nancy Rose, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Identifying Scale and Scope Economies using Demand-Side Data
Abstract
We propose an empirically tractable method to estimate economies of scale andscope. We start from a micro-founded model of production by a multi-product firm
and generate a set of estimating equations for the parameters governing scale and scope
economies, together with the distribution of within-firm productivity. A strength of
the method is that all parameters can be estimated using demand-side data only (i.e.,
quantities, prices, demand shifters). We apply this approach to the U.S. beer industry
to quantify the importance of scope economies for productive efficiency and evaluate
the impact of scale and scope economies on merger analysis.
Mergers and Quality Provision in Healthcare: Evidence from Nursing Homes
Abstract
This paper examines the quality effects of nursing home chains merging with independent nursing facilities. Using a facility-level dataset for skilled nursing homes in the U.S. for the period 1999 to 2019, we conduct a staggered difference-in-differences analysis. Our findings reveal that on average acquired facilities experience a 5% reduction in the number of health deficiency citations in the 2-year period following the merger. These quality improvements rely on a continuous supply of efficiency from chains; persist for at least four years following mergers; and are specific to chain mergers with independent homes. The quality effects are stronger in mergers involving smaller chains, cross-market mergers, and those occurring in rural areas. The quality effects of mergers lead to better health outcomes for residents in terms of lower risk of contractures and unplanned weight changes.What's the Difference? Measuring the Effect of Mergers in the Airline Industry
Abstract
We analyze the US airline merger wave from 2008 through 2013, which included three legacy mergers and one low-cost carrier merger. We find that these mergers resulted in substantial network consolidation and thereby sharp increases in the degree of multimarket contact. Conversely, the mergers had a negligible impact on the average route-level HHI on non-stop routes. We next estimate the price effect of each merger on overlap routes and non-overlap routes. Using the most recently developed difference-in-differences methodologies, synthetic DID and synthetic control, we find overlap routes did not experience statistically significant price changes from any of the mergers. Many non-overlap routes, where only one merging firm was present prior to the merger, experienced considerable and immediate increases in multimarket contact. We find that non-overlap routes with larger increases in multimarket contact had positive and significant price increases in legacy mergers. These findings demonstrate that non-overlap routes, which are typically not the focus of antitrust investigations, are subject to price increases arising from coordinated effects. As there are far more non-overlap routes than overlaps in airline mergers, a predominant effect of airlines mergers, coordinated price increases due to network consolidation, should be a primary focus of future antitrust analysis.Discussant(s)
Steven Tadelis
,
University of California-Berkeley
Mert Demirer
,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Natalia Serna
,
Stanford University
Nancy Rose
,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
JEL Classifications
- L4 - Antitrust Issues and Policies
- L1 - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance