Joacim Tåg

Network Neutrality on the Internet: A Two-Sided Market Analysis

We discuss network neutrality regulation of the Internet in the context of a two-sided market model. Platforms sell broadband Internet access services to residential consumers and may set fees to content and application providers on the Internet. When access is monopolized, cross-group externalities (network effects) can give a rationale for network neutrality regulation (requiring zero fees to content providers): there exist parameter ranges for which network neutrality regulation increases the total surplus compared to the fully private optimum at which the monopoly platform imposes positive fees on content providers. However, for other parameter values, network neutrality regulation can decrease total surplus. Extending the model to a duopoly of residential broadband ISPs, we again find parameter values such that network neutrality regulation increases total surplus suggesting that network neutrality regulation could be warranted even when some competition is present.

Paying to Remove Advertisements

Media firms sometimes allow consumers to pay to remove advertisements from an advertisement-based product. We formally examine an ad-based monopolist’s incentives to introduce this option. When deciding whether to introduce the option to pay, the monopolist compares the potential direct revenues from consumers with lost advertising revenues from not intermediating those consumers to advertisers. If the option is introduced, the media firm increases advertising quantity to make the option to pay more attractive. This hurts consumers, but bene…ts the media firm and advertisers. Total welfare may increase or decrease. Perhaps surprisingly, more annoying advertisements may lead to an increase in advertising quantity.

Network Neutrality and Network Management Regulation: Quality of Service, Price Discrimination, and Exclusive Contracts

We compare four approaches to network neutrality and network management regulation in a two-sided market model: (i) no variations in Quality of Service and no price discrimination; (ii) variations in Quality of Service but no price discrimination; (iii) variations in Quality of Service and price discrimination but no exclusive contracts; and (iv) no regulation: the network operator can sell exclusive rights to content providers. We compare the equilibrium outcomes explicitly accounting for dynamic incentives to invest in improving the Quality of Service offered to each content provider. We provide a ranking Quality of Service and network operator profits across regimes.

Production Hierarchies in Sweden

I study the internal organization of firms using occupation data on workers in Swedish manufacturing firms. Firms with more layers are larger in size, in value added, and they pay higher wages. Firms are hierarchal in that lower layers have more workers and lower mean wage than higher layers. Adding layers is associated with increases in mean firm size/value added and decreases in mean firm wages (at pre-existing layers). The reverse holds for removing layers. This result also holds for layer by layer mean size and wages for a majority of pre-existing layers.

The Real Effects of Private Equity Buyouts

Private equity buyouts have become a common element in the industrial development process. I survey the literature on the real economic effect of buyouts: employment, wages, productivity, and long-run investments. Employment tend to marginally fall after a buyout in most countries studied, with the exception being France. There are clear evidence of productivity gains following a buyout, with part of these being shared with worker through higher wages. The evidence is mixed regarding effects on long-run investments.

Private Equity, Layoffs, and Job Polarization

Private equity firms are often criticized for laying off workers, but the evidence on who loses their jobs and why is scarce. This paper argues that explanations for job polarization also explain layoffs after private equity buyouts. Buyouts reduce agency problems, which triggers automation and offshoring. Using rich employer-employee data, we show that buyouts generally do not affect unemployment incidence. However, unemployment incidence doubles for workers in less productive firms who perform routine or offshorable job tasks. Job polarization is also much more marked among workers affected by buyouts than for the economy at large.

Buying to Sell: A Theory of Buyouts

Private equity owned firms have more leverage, more intense compensation contracts, and higher productivity than comparable firms. We develop a theory of buyouts in oligopolistic markets that explains these facts. Private equity firms are more aggressive in inducing restructuring compared to incumbents since they maximize a trade sale price. The equilibrium trade sale price increases in restructuring not only by increasing the profit of the acquirer, but also by decreasing the profits of non-acquiring firms. Predictions on the exit mode and on when private equity firms can outbid incumbents in the market for corporate control are also derived.

Open Versus Closed Platforms

This paper studies an industry in which firms can choose to provide open or closed platforms. Open platforms, as opposed to closed, are extendable so third-party producers can develop extensions for them. Building on a two-sided market model, I show that firms might prefer to commit to keeping their platforms closed despite the fact that opening the platform is costless and open platforms are more valuable to consumers. The reason is that opening the platform may lead to intensified competition for consumers.

Efficiency and the Provision of Open Platforms

Private firms may not have efficient incentives to allow third-party producers to access their platform or develop extensions for their products. Based on a two-sided market model, I discuss two reasons for why. First, a private firm may not be able to internalize all benefits from cross-group externalities arising with third-party extensions. Second, firms may have strategic incentives to shut out third-parties because it relaxes competition.

Equal Opportunity? Gender Gaps in CEO Appointments and Executive Pay

Exceptionally rich data from Sweden makes it possible to study the gender gap in executives’ career progression and to investigate its causes. In their forties, female executives are about one-half as likely to be large-company CEOs and about one-third less likely to be high earners than male executives. Abilities, skills, and education likely do not explain these gaps because female executives appear better qualified than males. Instead, slow career progression in the five years after the first childbirth explains most of the female disadvantage. During this period, female executives work on average shorter hours than male executives and are more often absent from work. These results suggest that aspiring women may not reach the executive site without trading off family life.