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COMPETITION‐ACCELERATING PUBLIC INVESTMENTS *
Author(s) -
MATSUMURA TOSHIHIRO
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
australian economic papers
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.351
H-Index - 15
eISSN - 1467-8454
pISSN - 0004-900X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8454.2005.00264.x
Subject(s) - competition (biology) , investment (military) , economics , welfare , free entry , microeconomics , barriers to entry , industrial organization , business , market economy , market structure , ecology , politics , political science , law , biology
We investigate the effects of infrastructure investments that reduce transport costs. We use a spatial model of Salop (1979). It is well known that the number of firms is excessive at free‐entry equilibrium (excess entry theorem). We find that the optimal investment level exceeds the ex post cost‐minimising level because investments accelerate competition and reduce the number of entering firms; resulting in the improvement of welfare. We also show that, in cases where the excess‐entry theorem is true, the desirable policy is the one accelerating, rather than restricting, competition.