Buyers' and sellers' prices and administered behavior

A nonparametric time series test is applied to the buyers' and sellers' (BLS) prices collected by George Stigler and James Kindahl. Although BLS prices are more rigid, the two series of prices are sufficiently similar in behavior during two business cycles so that one can reject the null that each is generated by different stochastic processes. Moreover, each series reacts similarly in favor of the administrated prices hypothesis: in recessions and in the initial year of recovery, concentrated prices are more rigid and perversely flexible than unconcentrated prices, which are characterised by random movements and changes in the direction of real demand.