ABSTRACT
The absolute price that prevailed during the previous pricing period will itself depend on price changes that have occurred antecedently. In deciding what price should prevail, the megacorp cannot avoid peering at least that far into the future - even though the price decided upon can be changed precipitously, if necessary, at the end of the next pricing period. The very ability to coordinate pricing decisions among the various members of the industry may be jeopardized by the intrusion of a new enterprise, one without a vested interest in the price stability of the industry and, indeed, with a real need to undermine that stability if it is to obtain some minimum share of the market. Antitrust action having proven inadequate as a means of controlling pricing decisions indirectly through the restructuring of oligopolistic industries, it has devolved into an instrument of largely nuisance value.
