Collusive equilibria with switching costs: The effect of consumer concentration

I study the ability of two competing firms to set collusive prices in markets where consumers have switching costs. In consumer markets (with a small number of consumers), I find an antifolk result in which collusion, in the presence of switching costs, does not arise with patient firms. Patient firms compete aggressively and consumers expect a large utility. A collusive equilibrium is unstable because a deviating firm incorporates the future consumer utility in its deviating price. Also, consumers have a strategic impact so, with the prospects of large utility, they decide to switch to destabilize the firms' collusive agreement. These results do not eventuate in markets with a large number of consumers. In mass markets (a continuum of consumers), a single consumer lacks a strategic impact to destabilize a collusive agreement and a deviating firm cannot appropriate the consumer utility when deviating from collusion. Collusion, then, becomes straightforward to achieve. We show that for any number of consumers, switching costs make collusion easy to sustain.     

超市消费者购物行为理论研究

本文以理论研究的方法探讨了超市消费者在不同形态超市购物行为中三个重要的内容——择店行为、消费额度、消费频次。提出了购物效用在消费者购物行为中所起的作用以及择店行为、消费额度和消费频次之间的关系。经研究表明,不同形态超市为消费者带来的效用不同,这种效用的差别是影响消费者购物行为的关键因素。     

Derivative trading by utility firms

This paper examines the use of derivatives by a utility company. The hedging problem for utilities is atypical; the goal is not strictly to minimize average costs. Rather, the objectives are to minimize the upside risk associated with extreme bills, volatility of bills, and average expected bills for consumers. We characterize the optimal positions on futures contracts and options on futures that a utility company should assume. The results indicate that the use of derivatives (both futures and options on futures) is an efficient means of optimizing the objective functions without exposing consumers to speculative risk.     

Adaptation investments and homeownership

This article develops a model where ownership improves the efficiency of the housing market as it enhances the utility of housing consumption for some consumers. The model is based on an extended Hotelling–Lancaster utility approach in which the ideal variant of housing is obtainable only by adapting the home through a supplementary investment. Ownership offers low costs of adaptation, but has high contract costs compared with renting. Consumers simultaneously choose housing demand and tenure, and because of the different cost structure only consumers with strong preferences for individual adaptation of the home choose ownership. This article analyses the consumer’s optimization. The model provides an explanation for the observation that homeowners typically live in larger dwelling units than tenants. It also provides an explanation for a high price of housing services tending to reduce homeownership rates.     

Is the environment‐friendly factor attractive to customers when purchasing electric vehicles? Evidence from South Korea

In a bid to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, several countries worldwide are implementing policies to promote electric vehicles (EVs). However, contrary to expectations, the diffusion speed of EVs has been rather slow in South Korea. This study analyzes consumer preferences for the technological and environmental attributes of EVs and derives policy and environmental implications to promote market diffusion of EVs in South Korea. We conduct a choice‐based conjoint survey of 1,008 consumers in South Korea and estimate the consumer utility function using a mixed logit model considering consumer heterogeneity. Based on the consumer utility function, we analyze consumers' willingness‐to‐pay (WTP) for EV attributes such as driving range, charging method, charging time, autonomous driving function, carbon dioxide (CO₂) reduction rate, and purchase price. The results indicate that the current low acceptance of EVs is due to their relatively high price and lack of a battery charging technology that satisfies consumers' expectations of the charging method and time. One interesting finding is that Korean consumers have a relatively higher WTP for the CO₂ reduction rate of EVs than consumers in other countries; however, they do not consider CO₂ reduction over other technological attributes when choosing EVs. This implies that the rate of CO₂ reduction of EVs is not an important factor for South Korean consumers when buying EVs. We also calculate the effect of CO₂ reduction with the market penetration of EVs and find that CO₂ reduction through the diffusion of EVs depends on the country's electricity generation mix.     

消费者精神偏好视角下消费选择的经济学分析

消费选择问题是企业社会责任是否能够进行价值创造的关键环节。本文在结合弗洛伊德的精神分析理论基础上,将心理因素纳入传统的偏好效用框架,在消费者精神偏好视角下建立了全新的消费选择模型,并进一步分析发现,企业社会责任能够满足消费者精神层面的需求,得出主要结论如下:第一,不同层次的企业社会责任可以使其企业的产品满足消费者精神层面的需求并获得消费者偏好;第二,企业可以通过消费者精神层面需求的特征实现市场细分,并通过企业社会责任战略与项目的设计与实施,实现盈利能力的提升。     

Two-Sided Platforms: Product Variety and Pricing Structures

This paper provides a new modeling framework to analyze two-sided platforms connecting producers and consumers. In contrast to the existing literature, indirect network effects are determined endogenously, through consumers' taste for variety and producer competition. Three new aspects of platform pricing structures are derived.   First, the optimal platform pricing structure shifts towards extracting more rents from producers relative to consumers when consumers have stronger demand for variety, since producers become less substitutable. With platform competition, consumer preferences for variety, producer market power, and producer economies of scale in multihoming also make platforms' price-cutting strategies on the consumer side less effective. This second effect on equilibrium pricing structures goes in the opposite direction relative to the first one.   Third, variable fees charged to producers can serve to trade off producer innovation incentives against the need to reduce a platform holdup problem.     

爱国情感引发暂时性抵制冲突国产品行为的实验研究

随着全球化的进一步发展,各国间的经济、政治、军事、文化等突发性冲突也随之增多,这类矛盾会影响消费者在国际市场上的购买行为。此领域在国际营销界受到越来越多的关注,但在国内尚鲜有人进行实证研究。突发性的国家间冲突导致某国消费者暂时性地抵制另一国的产品,在此浪潮中影响个体消费者抵制行为的因素及作用机制是什么？本文在定性研究的基础上构建了一个新的概念——爱国情感,并建立假设与模型,然后用2×2×2的组间实验检验假设。本研究发现,当突发性国家冲突发生时,冲突所引发的消费者的爱国情感越强,冲突国产品的产品比较效用越低,则消费者越倾向于抵制该国产品。但是实验结果无法支持从众压力影响抵制行为的假设。     

Piecewise linear exchange equilibrium

It is known that if a pure exchange model in which all consumers have linear utility functions has an equilibrium it has one which is rational in the initial data. Examples show on the other hand that this is no longer true in general if utility functions are merely piecewise linear. In this note we observe that for the case of two traders the rationality result carries over and we sketch a finite procedure for calculating the equilibrium.     

Diversification preferences in the theory of choice

Diversification represents the idea of choosing variety over uniformity. Within the theory of choice, desirability of diversification is axiomatized as preference for a convex combination of choices that are equivalently ranked. This corresponds to the notion of risk aversion when one assumes the von Neumann–Morgenstern expected utility model, but the equivalence fails to hold in other models. This paper analyzes axiomatizations of the concept of diversification and their relationship to the related notions of risk aversion and convex preferences within different choice theoretic models. Implications of these notions on portfolio choice are discussed. We cover model-independent diversification preferences, preferences within models of choice under risk, including expected utility theory and the more general rank-dependent expected utility theory, as well as models of choice under uncertainty axiomatized via Choquet expected utility theory. Remarks on interpretations of diversification preferences within models of behavioral choice are given in the conclusion.     

Profit-maximizing communities and the theory of local public expenditures: Comment

It is argued that Sonstelie and Portney's proof that property-value maximization by each local community leads to Pareto efficient supplies of public goods is incorrect. In their analysis, property-value maximization is equivalent to profit maximization by communities. They contend that less than maximum levels of profits would lead to lower utility levels for consumers. However, in their proof, Sonstelie and Portney do not correctly characterize the implications of utility maximization. When those implications are correctly stated, their proof no longer holds.     

Ticket Scalping as a Means of Managing Risk

Ticket scalping (known as touting in the UK) is often criticised for raising prices to consumers and producing unjustified profits. Conventional economic theory, however, shows that ticket scalping allows tickets to be reallocated in a more optimal manner with regard to the utility of consumers. This article points to an additional benefit from ticket scalping: by providing a secondary market it acts as a potentially powerful tool of risk management for event organisers. It is argued that curtailing ticket scalping may in the long run lead to a decline in the supply of privately provided events and concerts, especially lesser‐known ones. This in turn may stimulate a demand for public subsidy.     

Continuous mean demand functions derived from non-convex preferences

In this paper we show that for a large subset of utility functions in the space of all C¹ utility functions and for all prices the mean demand of those consumers whose taste is represented by a given utility function in that subset is uniquely determined. This implies that for a large set of economies mean demand is a continuous function. Our analysis uses derivatives of first and of higher order. The result is essentially a consequence of the multijet transversality theorem.     

UGC的表现形式对网络营销效果的影响研究——以微博为例

随着Web2.0的兴起,用户创作内容（UGC）的概念应运而生,迅速发展并逐渐成为供应商组织生产、商家营销宣传以及消费者购买产品的利器.本论文梳理了UGC相关研究的分类和趋势,并选择微博作为平台,采用情景实验法,探究UGC的表现形式（文本、图片、音视频）对网络营销效果的影响,在此基础上为企业进行更大范围的社会化媒体营销（如博客、SNS社区等）提供策略性建议与营销思路,有效提升UGC互动的效用,在理论和实际应用上都有着显著意义.     

Identifying consumers' engagement with renewable energy

A moral engagement with sustainability enhances consumers' willingness to pay an increased rate for renewable energy when utility firms offer a variety of financial incentives to buy, rent and lease energy solutions to promote the uptake of energy‐efficient technologies. Using structural equation modelling, with data collected from 140 residential energy consumers in Canada, this paper tests and finds evidence that consumers' moral disengagement with environmental concerns negatively influences their willingness to pay more for renewable energy. Furthermore, it is observed that a consumer's perceived sense of control when evaluating energy solutions further accentuates the effects of moral disengagement on willingness to pay. These findings also illuminate the socio‐economic factors that encourage moral engagement concerning renewables. These findings underscore and build upon the claims of the theory of moral self‐regulation. The results and implications guide energy suppliers in potential niche business models to promote the uptake of energy efficient technologies. Similarly, the findings can guide policy‐makers on the cognitive and psychological factors that shape consumers' moral engagement with environmental concerns.     

Forecasting consumer credit card adoption: what can we learn about the utility function?

How to accurately predict customers’ adoption behavior is becoming more important and challenging to many credit card marketers as competition increases. This calls for more knowledge about the consumer utility function and the corresponding decision behavior. In this study, we challenge the commonly used logit model which implies linear utility function and constant marginal rate of substitution (MRS) with a neural network model that can accommodate nonlinear utility function and changing MRS between card attributes. Using the data from a national survey of credit card usage, we find that the neural network model significantly outperforms the logit in predicting consumer card adoption decisions. Our results indicate that consumers do not make linear tradeoffs between card attributes and the MRS between card features does not remain constant even within the same demographic group.     

Dynamic theory of preferences: Habit formation and taste for variety

We analyze individual preferences over infinite horizon consumption choices. Our axioms provide the foundation for a recursive representation of the utility function that contains as particular cases the classical Koopmans representation (Koopmans (1960)) as well as the habit formation specification.We examine some of the consequences of our axiomatization by considering a standard consumer choice problem, and show that typically in the space of concave utility functions satisfying our axioms the consumer displays a taste for variety. The latter means that such a consumer selects optimally time variant consumption programs for any given time invariant sequence of commodities’ relative prices and for all possible sequences of market discount factors. In contrast, if a concave utility function satisfies Koopmans’ axioms the consumer does not display a taste for variety.     

Firm entry,product repositioning and welfare

We show that the entry of a second firm in a horizontally differentiated market (ala Hotelling) may harm consumers as prices increase and consumer’s surplus possibly decrease. We first derive the price and the consumer’s surplus of a monopoly which is located at the center of the market. When a second firm enters the market the first firm repositions and the two firms locate at their equilibrium points. Although competition adds to variety and increases consumer’s surplus, the post entry increase in price may outweight the gains from extra variety and make consumers worse off.     

Residential spatial growth with perfect foresight and multiple income groups

This paper presents explicit solutions for expanding monocentric cities with two or more income groups. Housing is durable but deteriorates over time, and redevelopment cannot take place. Landlords have perfect foresight. The utility function and housing technology are Cobb-Douglas. Population, per capita income, and transportation costs per mile change at constant percentage rates. The model is solved analytically, using an infinite time horizon. As development proceeds outward, a constant fraction of land is developed with high-income housing, and the remaining land is reserved for future low-income development. At any time, housing is constructed at one distance for high-income consumers, and at a lesser distance for low-income consumers. High-income housing is first occupied by high-income consumers, then filters to low-income consumers, and is ultimately abandoned. Low-income housing is first occupied by low-income households, and ultimately abandoned.