Colluding Against Environmental Regulation

Résumé

We study collusion among ﬁrms against imperfectly monitored environmental regulation. Firms increase variable proﬁts by violating regulation and reduce expected noncompliance penal-ties by violating jointly. We consider a case of three German automakers colluding to reduce the eﬀectiveness of emissions control technology. By estimating a structural model of the European automobile industry from 2007 to 2018, we ﬁnd that collusion lowers expected noncompliance penalties substantially and increases buyer and producer surplus. Due to increased pollution, welfare decreases by e 1.57–5.57 billion. We show how environmental policy design and antitrust play complementary roles in preventing noncompliance.