Erik Brouwer

Tilburg University | UVT

This article tests whether the transition from the old Economic Competition Act, which was based on the so-called ‘abuse system’, to the new Competition Act, which was based on ‘prohibition system’, in the Netherlands had an impact on the Price-Cost Margins (PCM) of manufacturing firms during the period 1993 to 2006. The results indicate that the t...

This article investigates the determinants of innovative activities at the industry level for the Dutch manufacturing industries during the period 1993 to 2007. The results indicate that the transition from the old Economic Competition Act to the new Competition Act is statistically insignificantly associated with decreased innovation intensity, wh...

This article examines the determinants of antitrust immunity seeking behavior at the industry level in the Netherlands. Our findings suggest that market structure and the level of competition are important determinants of antitrust immunity seeking behavior. There were more dispensation requests in less competitive industries. On the other hand, we...

This paper tests whether the transition from the old Economic Competition Act, which was based on the so-called “abuse system”, to the new Competition Act, which was based on “prohibition system”, in the Netherlands had an impact on the price-cost margins in manufacturing industries during the period 1993-2007. The paper further investigates if the...

This paper tests whether the transition from the old Economic Competition Act, which was based on the so-called "abuse system", to the new Competition Act, which was based on "prohibition system", in the Netherlands had an impact on the price-cost margins in manufacturing industries during the period 1993-2007. The paper further investigates if the...

This paper examines the determinants of antitrust immunity seeking behavior at industry level for the Netherlands. Our findings suggest that market structure and the level of competition are important determinants of antitrust immunity seeking behavior. There were more dispensation requests in less competitive industries. On the other hand, we coul...

This paper provides an analysis of the European Commission (EC) decisions on state aid control using data on 550 state aid cases approved by the EC between 1998 and 2009. More specifically, we measure the determinants of the duration of state aid, total budget of state aid and daily budget of state aid. By using these imperfect proxies, we try to i...

This paper provides an analysis of the European Commission (EC) decisions on state aid control using data on 550 state aid cases approved by the EC between 1998 and 2009. More specifically, we measure the determinants of the duration of state aid, total budget of state aid and daily budget of state aid. By using these imperfect proxies, we try to i...

This paper examines the relationship between competition, innovation and productivity for the Netherlands. We use industry level data aggregated from micro data as well as moments from firm level data for the period 1996-2006. We match innovation data from Community Innovation Survey with accounting data to link innovative activities with performan...

From economic theory we derive a set of hypotheses on the determination of state aid. Econometric analysis on EU state aid panel data is carried out to test whether the determinants we expect on the basis of theory, correspond to the occurrence of state aid in practice in the EU. We find that political and constitutional characteristics play a sign...

Competition and innovation both stimulate the development and growth of the economy. The mutual effect on prosperity and welfare growth have been researched and published extensively. The effect between innovation and competition is often overlooked and it is this very nexus that can provide us with the key to answering the following questions abou...

The ambiguous relationship between competition and innovation as they appear in the economics literature is discussed. Due to the ambiguity of the type of relationship (positive or negative) between these two features, the need for a more dynamic model is apparent. A review of the literature indicates that there is no straightforward relation betwe...

This paper provides an analysis of the European Commission (EC) decisions on state aid control using data on 376 state aid cases approved by the EC between 1998 and 2009, and for which the DG Competition was the competent body for the application of state aid rules. More specifically, we investigate if there has been a change in the intensity of st...