Legal regulation of "involutionary" price subsidy competition among food delivery platforms
Ziyi Yan
School of Law, Anhui University of Finance and Economics
DOI: https://doi.org/10.59429/bam.v8i2.14523
Keywords: "involutionary" competition; legal regulation; consumer welfare; competition order
Abstract
Food delivery services have become an important business model that facilitates daily life. As the dominant players in the food delivery sector, the competitive strategies adopted by food delivery platforms directly affect the interests of on-platform merchants, delivery riders, and consumers. In the "subsidy wars" among food delivery platforms, platform operators rely on single-dimensional price competition, which brings low-price benefits to consumers in the short term. In the long run, however, the "involutionary" nature of such "subsidy wars" distorts market competition mechanisms, stifles innovation dynamism, and consequently leads to the entrenchment of market monopoly, increases the burden on on-platform operators and riders, and ultimately undermines consumer welfare. Given the network effects and scale effects of food delivery platforms, it is imperative to strengthen normalized regulation of platform price fluctuations, implement targeted legal regulation, enhance the transparency of platform rules, and improve cross-departmental coordinated regulation to ensure the healthy development of food delivery platforms.
References
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