Gender considerations in the analysis of market definition and competitive effects: A practical framework and illustrative example
White Paper, 2021
Analysis Group Managing Principals Lisa Pinheiro and Jee-Yeon Lehmann and Vice Presidents Anne Catherine Faye and Marissa Ginn submitted a paper to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) as part of the OECD’s Gender Inclusive Competition Policy project, undertaken in conjunction with the Canadian Competition Bureau. The paper, titled “Gender considerations in the analysis of market definition and competitive effects: A practical framework and illustrative example,” provides a possible framework for applying a gender lens to merger and antitrust analyses.
In their paper, the authors outline potential supply- and demand-side factors and data sources that could be used to evaluate the extent to which gender-based considerations might be relevant to analysis of competitive effects and early merger investigations. Using publicly available data collected from an online retailer, they show how their framework could be applied in practice through the analysis of a hypothetical merger between two consumer product firms. This illustrative example shows how preliminary analysis of competitive effects could identify relevant market features for competition analysis and inform whether additional investigations of gender-based factors may be warranted.
Authors
Pinheiro L, Faye AC, Ginn M, Lehmann J-Y, Posch J