| This dissertation contains three self contained chapters that study the interactions of non-linear price structures in different environments.;The first chapter considers a regulated environment where two increasing returns firms use two-part tariffs to cover losses that arise from marginal cost pricing. The chapter solves the problem of finding the largest possible hookups (first part of the tariff), which are always voluntarily paid by the buyers. Integral to the solution are new notions of substitutability, complementarity and normality, which have a global rather than local nature, and which are related to the more standard differential notions.;Chapters two and three consider general non-linear pricing in an oligopolisitic setting, where entry is restricted and resale forbidden. They consider a model in which two sellers of potentially different goods deal with the same group of buyers and play a one shot non-cooperative Nash game in which their strategies are price schedules. The buyers, when faced with each seller's price schedule, choose one point in each. Existence of equilibria is shown and their properties discussed. The two chapters differ in their informational assumptions: chapter two assumes that sellers have complete information, while chapter 3 assumes that buyers have private information, forcing the sellers to screen them via self-selection. In both settings, when the goods are substitutes, equilibrium price schedules must include offers which are never purchased. Moreover, the presence of these offers forces the sellers to share more surplus in equilibrium than when they cooperate. In contrast, in both settings, when the good are complements equilibria can replicate the cooperative outcome.;Finally a comparison of the two informational regimes shows that buyers with low willingness-to-pay for the seller's products are worse off as a result of having private information, while high willingness-to-pay buyers are better off. This differs from the result in monopoly non-linear pricing, where all buyers are made weakly better off by private information. |
