Network Centrality and Market Prices: Empirical Evidence
We empirically investigate the importance of centrality (holding a central position in a spatial network) for strategic interaction in pricing for the Austrian retail gasoline market. Results from spatial autoregressive models suggest that the gasoline station located most closely to the market center – defined as the 1-median location – exerts the strongest effect on pricing decisions of other stations. We conclude that centrality influences firms' pricing behaviour and further find that the importance of centrality increases with market size.
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