An Empirical Analysis of Internet Service Providers' Pricing of Television and Internet Services

本研究主要探讨网路服务供应商（ISP）对电视与网路服务的联合定价。随着Netflix和Hulu等流媒体视频服务的兴起，互联网服务提供商可能有动机利用其价格来影响消费者对电视和流媒体视频的选择。这些定价选择的重要考虑因素包括：提供电视和互联网内容的成本差异，消费者在娱乐选择中替代的意愿，以及互联网服务提供商和其他公司如何从不同类型的内容中获得不同的利益。研究人员开发了一个模型，将它们考虑在内。估计模型可以揭示互联网服务提供商的定价决策，也可以用于评估电信行业的反垄断问题。这项研究估计了电视和互联网服务的需求和供应模型。调查人员可以访问有关家庭对电视和互联网订阅和使用的选择的非常详细的数据，并使用这些数据来估计消费者对各种娱乐选项的偏好，包括ISP直接销售的服务（例如电视和互联网接入）和第三方流媒体服务。在供应方面，本研究估计的目标功能的互联网服务提供商和内容提供商，而会计公司之间的潜在复杂的关系和差异，在他们的成本结构，这与他们的角色在内容交付给消费者。使用估计的模型，研究人员模拟了在几种不同的情况下价格将如何变化（以及消费者和公司将如何受到影响）。例如，采用针对具体来源的歧视性定价（例如，互联网服务提供商向使用各种流媒体服务的消费者收取特别附加费）可能会影响消费者对市场上各种视频选择的需求，如果互联网服务提供商能够以这种方式进行价格歧视，许多价格可能会发生变化。该估算模型还可用于研究当企业可以使用复杂的价格来限制消费者对竞争企业服务的访问或使用时，企业整合或引入新流媒体服务的动机如何变化。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This research focuses on internet service providers' (ISP) joint pricing of television and internet services. With the recent rise of streaming video services like Netflix and Hulu, ISPs may have an incentive to use their prices to influence consumers' choices across TV and streaming video options. Important considerations for these pricing choices include: the cost differences in delivering TV and internet content, the willingness of consumers to substitute across entertainment options, and how ISPs and other firms benefit differently from different sorts of content. The investigators develop a model that take them into account. The estimated model can shed light on ISPs' pricing decisions, and can be also useful for evaluating antitrust issues in the telecommunications industry. This research estimates a model of demand and supply for television and internet services. The investigators have access to highly detailed data on households' choices over TV and internet subscriptions and usage, and use these data to estimate consumers' preferences across a wide variety of entertainment options, including services sold directly by ISPs (e.g. TV and internet access) and by third-party streaming services. On the supply side, this research estimates the objective functions of ISPs and content providers while accounting for potentially complex relationships among firms and differences in their cost structures, which vary with their roles in content delivery to consumers. Using the estimated model, the investigators simulate how prices will change (and how consumers and firms would be affected) under several different scenarios. For example, the introduction of source-specific discriminatory pricing (e.g. special ISP surcharges to consumers for using various streaming services) may affect consumers' demand for the full range of video options available in the market, and many prices are likely to change if ISPs can price discriminate in this way. The estimated model can be also used to study how firms' incentives to integrate or introduce new streaming services vary when firms can use sophisticated prices to curtail consumers' access to or usage of competing firms' services.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.