Workshop "Consumer Search and Switching Costs"

The Erasmus University Rotterdam hosts an ENCORE-workshop on "Consumer Search and Switching Costs". Local organizer and workshop chair is Maarten Janssen (Erasmus University).

The objective of the workshop is to get a better understanding of the important role of consumers in creating competitive markets. The standard economic literature assumes consumers always make perfectly rational choices, can gain information costlessly and switch between firms costlessly. We know from the literature on bounded rationality, consumer search and switching costs that when one of these assumptions fails, consumers may actually behave in very many different ways. In the workshop three papers are presented to evaluate the importance of these alternative ways of thinking about of consumer behavior while reforming markets.

Date: Thursday February 23, 2006
Venue: Erasmus University Rotterdam
Room: H17-02 (building H)

> Click here for the program.

> Click here to register.

Annual Conference 2006 "Consumers and Competition"

The ENCORE Annual Conference "Consumers and Competition" will take place on April 13, 2006.
Venue: Koninklijke Schouwburg, The Hague

Key-note speakers are:

- Michael Waterson, Professor of Industrial Economics at Warwick University (UK).

- Barry Schwartz, Dorwin Cartwright Professor of Social Theory and Social Action at Schwarthmore College (USA). He is the author of 'The Paradox of Choice'.

Further contributions will be made by Eric van Damme (Tilburg University), Fred van Raaij (Tilburg University), Frank de Grave (Netherlands Health Care Authority), Derk Reneman (Ministry of Education, Culture and Science), Albert Scholten (Netherlands Competition Authority) and Fieke van der Lecq (Netherlands Competition Authority).

Marcel Canoy (European Commission) will present the ENCORE Masters' Thesis Prize.

The conference website, including information about the plenary and parallel sessions, will be launched at the end of February. Online registration will be possible as of March 1.

Visitors and brainstorms

Mike Waldman and Yongmin Chen, contributors to the workshop "Consumer Search and Switching Costs" (23 Feb), will participate in a brainstorm of the Ministry of Economic Affair and the Competition Authority on the revision of Article 82 EC’s application.

Both Michael Waterson and Barry Schwartz, plenary speakers at the Annual Conference, will extend their stay for a visitors programme that is currently put together.

Seminar "Voice over Internet Protocol"

March 7, ENCORE-Fellows Paul de Bijl (Tilburg University) and Martin Peitz (International University Germany) will give a lunch-seminar at OPTA on the ENCORE research-paper "Voice Over Internet Protocol".

The lunch-seminar will be followed by a brainstorm at OPTA about various topics.

Participation is by invitation only.

 
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Francesco Russo

As of January 2006, Francesco Russo works on the ENCORE project 'Handbook Case Studies' (see below). Francesco holds law degrees from both the University of Napels and the University of Amsterdam.

Koert van Buiren

Koert van Buiren is a senior researcher at SEO Economic Research, specialized in Industrial Economics. He is an ENCORE visitor for one day per week, working towards a PhD-thesis on State Aid and Competition.

 
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Summer Schools

ENCORE Schools are intensive courses in the field of Industrial Organization, in particular competition and regulation.

ENCORE Schools are taught at three levels: principles, intermediate, and graduate. The principles and intermediate schools are taught in Dutch, the graduate school is taught in English.

Detailed information about these courses (including registration form) is available by clicking the links below:

 
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Handbook Case Studies

ENCORE is preparing a Handbook Case Studies on DG Competition Decisions. It takes the form of a syllabus for applied IO courses.

The project is supervised by a team consisting of Martin Carree and Andrea Günster (Maastricht University) and Maarten Pieter Schinkel, Jules Theeuwes, Jeroen Hinloopen and Francesco Russo (ENCORE, University of Amsterdam).

> Click here for more information.

 
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ENCORE Once More
This e-mail newsletter aims to inform about the activities of ENCORE, Economic Network for Competition and Regulation.

If you wish to unsubscribe, please send us an e-mail with 'unsubscribe' in the header.

 
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