We analyze welfare under differential versus uniform pricing across oligopoly markets that differ in costs of service, and establish general demand conditions for differential pricing by symmetric firms to increase consumer surplus, profit, and total welfare. The analysis reveals why competitive differential pricing is generally beneficial—more than price discrimination—but not always, including why profit may fall, unlike for monopoly. The presence of more competitors tends to enlarge consumers' share of the gain from differential pricing, though profits often still rise. When firms have asymmetric costs, however, profit or consumer surplus can fall even with ‘simple’ linear demands.

中文翻译：

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有竞争力的差异定价

我们分析了服务成本不同的寡头市场在差异定价和统一定价下的福利，并建立了对称公司差异定价的一般需求条件，以增加消费者剩余，利润和总福利。该分析揭示了为什么竞争性差异定价通常比定价歧视更有益，而不是价格歧视，但并非总是如此，包括为什么利润可能下降（不同于垄断）。尽管利润通常仍会增加，但更多竞争者的存在往往会扩大消费者在差别定价中获得的收益的份额。但是，当企业的成本不对称时，即使线性需求“简单”，利润或消费者剩余也会下降。