Find my SSRN page here
Working papers:
"Digitization and the Demand for Physical Works: Evidence from the Google Books Project" (with Abhishek Nagaraj) [paper] (R&R, Management Science)
The age of digitization promised to deliver a centralized, digital repository of all knowledge. Copyright holders, however, concerned about reduced demand for physical works, have blocked the realization of this vision. We investigate the effect of digitization on demand for physical works using novel data tracking the timing of the digitization of individual books from Harvard University's libraries through the Google Books project. Digitization hurt loans within Harvard but increased sales of physical editions by about 35%, especially for less popular works. Rather than cannibalizing demand, digitization might benefit copyright holders through increased discovery of less popular works.
"Digitization and Market Efficiency: Evidence from Book Publishing Deals" (with Christian Peukert) [paper] (Reject & Resubmit, Management Science)
Digitization has given creators direct access to consumers as well as a plethora of new data to draw on, both of which change their negotiations with intermediaries. We study how these changes affect book authors’ advances from publishers. Using data on about 50,000 book deals over more than ten years and taking advantage of quasi-experimental variation across book types, we find that digitization leads to more favorable license deals for authors. Consistent with digitization generating additional information for predicting product appeal, we then show that the advances more accurately reflect a product’s ex-post success, although the effects vary across publishers. Digitization can thus have large impacts on the distribution of rents among intermediaries and creators in any market in which product appeal is difficult to predict ex-ante.
"Visibility of Technology and Cumulative Innovation: Evidence from Trade Secrecy Protection Laws" (with Bernhard Ganglmair) [paper]
Patents grant an inventor temporary monopoly rights in exchange for the disclosure of the patented invention. However, if only those inventions that are otherwise already visible are patented (and others kept secret), then the bargain fails. We use exogenous variation in the strength of trade secrets protection from the Uniform Trade Secrets Act to show that a relative weakening of patents (compared to trade secrets) adversely affects the rate of process patents relative to products. By arguing that processes are on average less visible (or self-disclosing) than products, we show that stronger trade secrets have a disproportionately negative effect on the disclosure of inventions that are not otherwise visible to society. We develop a structural model of initial and follow-on innovation to determine the effects of such a shift in disclosure on overall welfare in industries characterized by cumulative innovation. In counterfactual analyses, we find that while stronger trade secrets encourage more investment in R&D, they may have negative effects on overall welfare -- the result of a significant decline in follow-on innovation. This is especially the case in industries with relatively profitable R&D.
"Offline Firm Exit and Online Prices" (with Leshui He and Benjamin Shiller) [paper]
Digitization has introduced challenges to existing retailers in the form of online competition, leading many brick-and-mortar firms to close their doors in recent years. We study the impacts of such changes in concentration on prices set by the remaining firms. Our empirical setting covers the unexpected shutdown of all US stores of the major toy and baby products retailer Toys R Us. Using various triple-differences strategies, we document rises in average toy prices at Amazon due to the exit of Toys R Us, with large differences in the effects across products. While prices rise unambiguously for the largest toys, prices for small products - arguably those for which Amazon had the largest cost advantage - did not increase and may have even decreased. The results are consistent with simple Hotelling and Salop models that show that firm exit can result in lower prices if the exiting firm has a cost disadvantage. Our findings have important implications for antitrust and competition policy.
Published/accepted articles:
"Digitization and Pre-Purchase Information: The Causal and Welfare Impacts of Reviews and Crowd Ratings" with Joel Waldfogel
(American Economic Review, forthcoming) [paper]
"The Impacts of Telematics on Competition and Consumer Behavior in Insurance" with Benjamin Shiller
(Journal of Law and Economics, 2019) [paper]
"Copyright and Generic Entry in Book Publishing"
(American Economic Journal - Microeconomics, 2019) [paper]
(New York Times article)
"Do Coupons Expand or Cannibalize Revenue? Evidence from an e-Market" with Claire (Chunying) Xie
(Management Science, 2018) [paper]
"Are Public and Private Enforcement Complements or Substitutes? Evidence from High Frequency Data" with Gregory DeAngelo and Brad Humphreys
(Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 2017) [paper]
(Sports Illustrated article)
"Examining Regulatory Capture: Evidence from the NHL" with Gregory DeAngelo and Adam Nowak
(Contemporary Economic Policy, 2017) [paper]
"Throwing the Books at Them: Amazon's Puzzling Long-Run Pricing Strategy" with Joel Waldfogel
(Southern Economic Journal, 2017) [paper]
"Can Private Copyright Protection be Effective? Evidence from Book Publishing"
(Journal of Law and Economics, 2016) [paper]
(Publishers Weekly article)
"Storming the Gatekeepers: Digital Disintermediation in the Market for Books" with Joel Waldfogel
(Information Economics and Policy, 2015) [link]
Here is a link to data sources on the economics of digitization.
Working papers:
"Digitization and the Demand for Physical Works: Evidence from the Google Books Project" (with Abhishek Nagaraj) [paper] (R&R, Management Science)
The age of digitization promised to deliver a centralized, digital repository of all knowledge. Copyright holders, however, concerned about reduced demand for physical works, have blocked the realization of this vision. We investigate the effect of digitization on demand for physical works using novel data tracking the timing of the digitization of individual books from Harvard University's libraries through the Google Books project. Digitization hurt loans within Harvard but increased sales of physical editions by about 35%, especially for less popular works. Rather than cannibalizing demand, digitization might benefit copyright holders through increased discovery of less popular works.
"Digitization and Market Efficiency: Evidence from Book Publishing Deals" (with Christian Peukert) [paper] (Reject & Resubmit, Management Science)
Digitization has given creators direct access to consumers as well as a plethora of new data to draw on, both of which change their negotiations with intermediaries. We study how these changes affect book authors’ advances from publishers. Using data on about 50,000 book deals over more than ten years and taking advantage of quasi-experimental variation across book types, we find that digitization leads to more favorable license deals for authors. Consistent with digitization generating additional information for predicting product appeal, we then show that the advances more accurately reflect a product’s ex-post success, although the effects vary across publishers. Digitization can thus have large impacts on the distribution of rents among intermediaries and creators in any market in which product appeal is difficult to predict ex-ante.
"Visibility of Technology and Cumulative Innovation: Evidence from Trade Secrecy Protection Laws" (with Bernhard Ganglmair) [paper]
Patents grant an inventor temporary monopoly rights in exchange for the disclosure of the patented invention. However, if only those inventions that are otherwise already visible are patented (and others kept secret), then the bargain fails. We use exogenous variation in the strength of trade secrets protection from the Uniform Trade Secrets Act to show that a relative weakening of patents (compared to trade secrets) adversely affects the rate of process patents relative to products. By arguing that processes are on average less visible (or self-disclosing) than products, we show that stronger trade secrets have a disproportionately negative effect on the disclosure of inventions that are not otherwise visible to society. We develop a structural model of initial and follow-on innovation to determine the effects of such a shift in disclosure on overall welfare in industries characterized by cumulative innovation. In counterfactual analyses, we find that while stronger trade secrets encourage more investment in R&D, they may have negative effects on overall welfare -- the result of a significant decline in follow-on innovation. This is especially the case in industries with relatively profitable R&D.
"Offline Firm Exit and Online Prices" (with Leshui He and Benjamin Shiller) [paper]
Digitization has introduced challenges to existing retailers in the form of online competition, leading many brick-and-mortar firms to close their doors in recent years. We study the impacts of such changes in concentration on prices set by the remaining firms. Our empirical setting covers the unexpected shutdown of all US stores of the major toy and baby products retailer Toys R Us. Using various triple-differences strategies, we document rises in average toy prices at Amazon due to the exit of Toys R Us, with large differences in the effects across products. While prices rise unambiguously for the largest toys, prices for small products - arguably those for which Amazon had the largest cost advantage - did not increase and may have even decreased. The results are consistent with simple Hotelling and Salop models that show that firm exit can result in lower prices if the exiting firm has a cost disadvantage. Our findings have important implications for antitrust and competition policy.
Published/accepted articles:
"Digitization and Pre-Purchase Information: The Causal and Welfare Impacts of Reviews and Crowd Ratings" with Joel Waldfogel
(American Economic Review, forthcoming) [paper]
"The Impacts of Telematics on Competition and Consumer Behavior in Insurance" with Benjamin Shiller
(Journal of Law and Economics, 2019) [paper]
"Copyright and Generic Entry in Book Publishing"
(American Economic Journal - Microeconomics, 2019) [paper]
(New York Times article)
"Do Coupons Expand or Cannibalize Revenue? Evidence from an e-Market" with Claire (Chunying) Xie
(Management Science, 2018) [paper]
"Are Public and Private Enforcement Complements or Substitutes? Evidence from High Frequency Data" with Gregory DeAngelo and Brad Humphreys
(Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 2017) [paper]
(Sports Illustrated article)
"Examining Regulatory Capture: Evidence from the NHL" with Gregory DeAngelo and Adam Nowak
(Contemporary Economic Policy, 2017) [paper]
"Throwing the Books at Them: Amazon's Puzzling Long-Run Pricing Strategy" with Joel Waldfogel
(Southern Economic Journal, 2017) [paper]
"Can Private Copyright Protection be Effective? Evidence from Book Publishing"
(Journal of Law and Economics, 2016) [paper]
(Publishers Weekly article)
"Storming the Gatekeepers: Digital Disintermediation in the Market for Books" with Joel Waldfogel
(Information Economics and Policy, 2015) [link]
Here is a link to data sources on the economics of digitization.
