Analysing the birth and death of cartels: European Commission, 2001-2022

Abstract

This dissertation first gives a through overview of the literature covering the US and EU and makes comparisons about the histories. This dissertation then, uses data on the birth and death of all cartels and antitrust submitted to the European Commission from 2001-2022. I use several models including the Negative Binomial regression to look further into the changes of the number of birth and death; to see whether there is an industry effect, or whether there has been a significant increase/decrease during any of the Former Colleges of Commissioners. I also look to see whether there is a correlation between the average of duration of cartels and antitrust and the number of birth and death. I find that there has been a significant negative trend in both death and birth in cartels and antitrust. I find while manufacturing has had the highest number of cartels, there does not seem any evidence to suggest that any of the Former Colleges of Commissioners were different from each other. The correlation between the average duration of cartels and antitrust is a mixed picture, but none are significant.