Precios relativos ramas altamente concentradas

Abstract

Two previous studies have examined the price trajectory of oligopolistic firms. One of them found that highly concentrated branches of the manufacturing industry raised their wholesale prices above average by 7.6% between 2001 and 2010 mainly as a result of the mega-devaluation in 2002 (Manzanelli and Schorr, 2013). The other study found that such gap was 2.5% higher between 2007 and 2014, with the difference in prices occurring in the 2010-2011 biennium and in the context of the 2014 devaluation (Manzanelli, 2016). This article builds on the methodology of those research studies. It starts from the findings made by Azpiazu (2011) about industrial concentration and it reconciles industrial branches according to their concentration strata with the Internal Basic Wholesale Price Index (IPIB). This allowed building weighted price indices on the basis of their weight in the industrial production value for each concentration stratum (particular emphasis was placed on highly concentrated branches as they are the subject-matter of analysis of this article). However, unlike the previous studies, this study was based on information published by INDEC, which has a disaggregation of prices that is lower than that required for this calculation (breakdown at ISIC 5 digits). As a result, the study classified 69 out of the 86 industrial branches that INDEC surveyed and for which it published their wholesale prices. Of those 69 classified branches, 37 are highly concentrated branches, 24 are moderately concentrated branches and 8 are scarcely concentrated branches. This is indeed a preliminary analysis which, as it relies on published information, can be replicated by other studies. References ●Azpiazu, D. (2011). La concentración en la industria argentina a principios del siglo XXI. Editorial Cara o Ceca, Buenos Aires. ●Manzanelli, P. y Schorr, M. (2013): “Aproximación al proceso de formación de precios en la industria argentina en la posconvertibilidad”, Revista Realidad Económica, Instituto Argentino para el Desarrollo Económico, Nº 273, Buenos Aires. ●Manzanelli, P. (2016): “Grandes empresas y estrategias de inversión en la Argentina 2002-2012”. Desarrollo Económico, N° 218, Buenos Aires.