Abstract
In the 1980s it became increasingly clear that the European Community market was still segmented by national borders because of non-tariff barriers to trade. A major objective of the Single Market Program in 1992 was to remove these barriers, thereby enforcing intra-union competition. In this paper, a panel of Swedish firm-level data is used to evaluate whether domestic market power has been curtailed as a consequence of the SMP and of the Swedish membership in the European Union in 1995. Evidence of increased competition emerges, as price-cost margins have declined in industries with high non-tariff barriers prior to 1992.
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JEL Classification Numbers: F15, L11, C33
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Gullstrand, J., Johansson, H. The Disciplinary Effect of the Single Market on Swedish Firms. Open Econ Rev 16, 381–398 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11079-005-4743-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11079-005-4743-3