TY - JOUR
T1 - Wal-Mart's monopsony power in metro and non-metro labor markets
AU - Bonanno, Alessandro
AU - Lopez, Rigoberto A.
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank two anonymous referees, the journal editor—Daniel McMillen, Ronald Cotterill, Xenia Matsche, Emek Basker, Delia Furtado, and Elena Lopez for their invaluable comments and suggestions that significantly improved this article. Funding from the Zwick Center for Food and Resource Policy (formerly the Food Marketing Policy Center) via USDA-NIFA 2010-34178-20766 and from the Storrs and The Pennsylvania State University Agricultural Experiment Station is gratefully acknowledged. The content of the paper, of course, is the sole responsibility of the authors.
PY - 2012/7
Y1 - 2012/7
N2 - This paper measures the potential degree of monopsony power that Wal-Mart can exert over retail workers using a dominant-firm model and nationwide, county-level data, presenting for the first time a measure of the company's potential anti-competitive behavior and detailed spatial impacts on wages, particularly for metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties. Empirical results show that, at the national level, Wal-Mart's potential wage markdown below the competitive level amounts to less than 3% on average. However, the potential markdowns in non-metropolitan counties are three-fold those in metropolitan counties and are highest in non-metro areas of the south and central states but negligible in northeastern states.
AB - This paper measures the potential degree of monopsony power that Wal-Mart can exert over retail workers using a dominant-firm model and nationwide, county-level data, presenting for the first time a measure of the company's potential anti-competitive behavior and detailed spatial impacts on wages, particularly for metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties. Empirical results show that, at the national level, Wal-Mart's potential wage markdown below the competitive level amounts to less than 3% on average. However, the potential markdowns in non-metropolitan counties are three-fold those in metropolitan counties and are highest in non-metro areas of the south and central states but negligible in northeastern states.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2012.02.003
DO - 10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2012.02.003
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84858249185
SN - 0166-0462
VL - 42
SP - 569
EP - 579
JO - Regional Science and Urban Economics
JF - Regional Science and Urban Economics
IS - 4
ER -