Tesis
Price dispersion in Argentina
Autor
Albornoz, Facundo
Institución
Resumen
We investigate how the structure of price dispersion is in Argentina. We use daily data
reported by supermarkets and we measure price dispersion at the bar code level in order to
analyze whether supermarkets set prices differently, whether those price differences are
spatial or temporal, and whether a large devaluation shock affects pricing behavior. We use
more than 9 million prices and we calculate the dispersion of weekly prices relative to the
average monthly price per product. We found that on average across products the 90th
percentile of relative prices is 10 percentage points higher than the 10th and the mean
absolute deviation from monthly average product prices is 2%. Price dispersion across stores
in Argentina is heterogeneous among retail chains but local conditions regarding demand or
competition contribute significantly but they have small impact. Furthermore, we tested that
supermarkets pricing behavior remains within its essence after a large devaluation shock.