Asymmetric Information and Middleman Margins : An Experiment with Indian Potato Farmers
West Bengal potato farmers cannot directly access wholesale markets and do not knowwholesale prices. Local middlemen earn large margins; pass-through from wholesale to farmgate prices is negligible. When we informed farmers in randomly chosen villages about wholesale prices, average farmgate sales a...
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| Format: | Journal Article |
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The MIT Press
2018
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10986/29657 |
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okr-10986-296572021-05-25T10:54:36Z Asymmetric Information and Middleman Margins : An Experiment with Indian Potato Farmers Mitra, Sandip Mookherjee, Dilip Torero, Maximo Visaria, Sujata WEST BENGAL MIDDLEMEN FARMGATE PRICES POTATO FARMERS West Bengal potato farmers cannot directly access wholesale markets and do not knowwholesale prices. Local middlemen earn large margins; pass-through from wholesale to farmgate prices is negligible. When we informed farmers in randomly chosen villages about wholesale prices, average farmgate sales and prices were unaffected, but pass-through to farmgate prices increased. These results can be explained by a model where farmers bargain ex post with village middlemen, with the outside option of selling to middlemen outside the village. They are inconsistent with standard oligopolistic models of pass-through, search frictions, or risk-sharing contracts. 2018-04-11T17:06:37Z 2018-04-11T17:06:37Z 2018-03 Journal Article Review of Economics and Statistics http://hdl.handle.net/10986/29657 CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo World Bank The MIT Press Publications & Research :: Journal Article Publications & Research South Asia India |
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Digital Repository |
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Foreign Institution |
| institution |
Digital Repositories |
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World Bank Open Knowledge Repository |
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World Bank |
| topic |
WEST BENGAL MIDDLEMEN FARMGATE PRICES POTATO FARMERS |
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WEST BENGAL MIDDLEMEN FARMGATE PRICES POTATO FARMERS Mitra, Sandip Mookherjee, Dilip Torero, Maximo Visaria, Sujata Asymmetric Information and Middleman Margins : An Experiment with Indian Potato Farmers |
| geographic_facet |
South Asia India |
| description |
West Bengal potato farmers cannot directly access wholesale markets and do not knowwholesale prices. Local middlemen earn large margins; pass-through from wholesale to farmgate prices is negligible. When we informed farmers in randomly chosen villages about wholesale prices, average farmgate sales and prices were unaffected, but pass-through to farmgate prices increased. These results can be explained by a model where farmers bargain ex post with village middlemen, with the outside option of selling to middlemen outside the village. They are inconsistent with standard oligopolistic models of pass-through, search frictions, or risk-sharing contracts. |
| format |
Journal Article |
| author |
Mitra, Sandip Mookherjee, Dilip Torero, Maximo Visaria, Sujata |
| author_facet |
Mitra, Sandip Mookherjee, Dilip Torero, Maximo Visaria, Sujata |
| author_sort |
Mitra, Sandip |
| title |
Asymmetric Information and Middleman Margins : An Experiment with Indian Potato Farmers |
| title_short |
Asymmetric Information and Middleman Margins : An Experiment with Indian Potato Farmers |
| title_full |
Asymmetric Information and Middleman Margins : An Experiment with Indian Potato Farmers |
| title_fullStr |
Asymmetric Information and Middleman Margins : An Experiment with Indian Potato Farmers |
| title_full_unstemmed |
Asymmetric Information and Middleman Margins : An Experiment with Indian Potato Farmers |
| title_sort |
asymmetric information and middleman margins : an experiment with indian potato farmers |
| publisher |
The MIT Press |
| publishDate |
2018 |
| url |
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/29657 |
| _version_ |
1764469905901486080 |