The Price of Media Capture in Interwar France
Abstract: This paper develops a new insight for the empirical study of media capture. Capture is impossible to observe but its value should be reflected in transactions involving journal stocks. Interwar France provides a unique setting to document this because key newspapers floated voting and non-voting stocks. Combined with takeover prices, this data yields estimates of amounts paid by owners to capture journals and of the time series evolution of this price. Comparison with Britain suggests that Britain protected its newspapers better. These results are also interesting for the light they shed on the French history
