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Decentralized Decision-Making in Retail Chains: Evidence from Inventory Management

Victor Aguirregabiria, Francis Guiton

arXiv 9 Jul 2023 · Econometrics · 2 citations (OpenAlex)

arXiv:2307.05562 · PDF · DOI · OpenAlex · Extracted main text

Abstract

This paper investigates the impact of decentralizing inventory decision-making in multi-establishment firms using data from a large retail chain. Analyzing two years of daily data, we find significant heterogeneity among the inventory decisions made by 634 store managers. By estimating a dynamic structural model, we reveal substantial heterogeneity in managers' perceived costs. Moreover, we observe a correlation between the variance of these perceptions and managers' education and experience. Counterfactual experiments show that centralized inventory management reduces costs by eliminating the impact of managers' skill heterogeneity. However, these benefits are offset by the negative impact of delayed demand information.

Citation extraction

39
references
102
in-text mentions
39
distinct cited
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main-text words

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Most heavily cited references

The works this paper leans on most, across its whole bibliography — not restricted to papers in our corpus. Ranked by composite intensity, which combines how often a work is mentioned, how many sections mention it, and how much of that falls in the main text rather than the appendix.

ReferenceIntensityMentionsSectionsMain text
1V. Aguirregabiria, D. Ershov, and J. Suzuki (2016) Estimating the effects of deregulation in the ontario wine retail market1.00063100%
2J. Adda and R. Cooper (2000) Balladurette and juppette: A discrete analysis of scrapping subsidies0.81142100%
3O. Attanasio (2000) Consumer durables and inertial behaviour: Estimation and aggregation of (s, s) rules for automobile purchases0.81142100%
4S. DellaVigna and M. Gentzkow (2019) Uniform pricing in us retail chains0.81142100%
5J. Eberly (1994) Adjustment of consumers' durables stocks: Evidence from automobile purchases0.81142100%
6A. Hortacsu, O. Natan, H. Parsley, T. Schwieg, and K. Williams (2021) Organizational structure and pricing: Evidence from a large us airline0.81142100%
7Liquor Control Board of Ontario (2016) An introduction to web based ordering & sos (store order services), 20160.81142100%
8V. Aguirregabiria (1999) The dynamics of markups and inventories in retailing firms0.73732100%
9R. Bray, Y. Yao, Y. Duan, and J. Huo (2019) Ration gaming and the bullwhip effect0.73732100%
10V. Aguirregabiria and P. Mira (2002) Swapping the nested fixed point algorithm: A class of estimators for discrete markov decision models0.69361100%

Showing the top 10 of 39 scored citations.

Cited by, within the corpus

arXiv econ.EM papers that cite this one, ranked by how heavily they lean on it.

Citing paperIntensityMentionsSections
1Nested Pseudo-GMM Estimation of Demand for Differentiated Products0.51121