Consumer well-being in a future of accelerating novelty

Novel goods and ideas are introduced to today’s consumers with increasing frequency. This phenomenon is perhaps most notable in the apparel industry, which in recent decades has seen the rise of “fast fashion” and an accelerating rate of novel style introductions from semi-annual to semi-weekly. In this paper I study the potential for this type of accelerating novelty to have a negative impact on consumer well-being. I analyze a simple theoretical model of consumer behavior in which consumers with a preference for novelty decide how fast to replace their fashion goods before and after an innovation which accelerates the rate at which new goods become available. In the basic model, where consumers update their goods based on their intrinsic preference for novelty, the novelty-accelerating innovation is not welfare-decreasing. However, when the model is extended in realistic ways, I find that there are at least three conditions under which the innovation may decrease welfare by increasing the extent of sub-optimal replacement: if there are external costs of updating to a newer good; if the consumers are boundedly rational and exhibit present bias; or if consumers’ replacement decisions reflect an arms race for social status. My results in these model extensions provide an economic foundation for rising popular concern about undesirable social effects of “fast fashion.” I also discuss the implications of these results for future patterns of consumption, which are likely to reflect still more accelerated novelty and possibly the expansion of fashion behavior to a broader range of consumption settings.     

消费者寻求多样化与企业定价竞争

消费者寻求多样化的购买行为会对寡头企业之间的价格竞争和经济效率产生重要影响。文章研究发现,针对消费者寻求多样化的购买行为,企业会对忠诚的消费者给予价格优惠,而对新顾客索取高价;消费者寻求多样化购买行为弱化了企业两期价格竞争,导致"默契合谋";而以两期统一定价为基准的经济效率分析显示,歧视定价机制促进了企业间竞争,导致消费者剩余增加,企业利润减少。     

Consumer demand for local honey

How to best target and attract niche market consumers is an important marketing problem for producers of specialty agricultural products. It is particularly an issue in the honey market where consumers increasingly face media messages regarding threats to honey bee health, honey adulteration and health benefits of locally produced honey. Using auction experiments, this research evaluates consumer behaviour related to informational messages about honey that is produced locally, domestically and internationally. Results from 115 adult consumers show that consumers’ demand for honey varies significantly based on the geographic location of the honey’s production, product packaging and the information they have about the product. Consumers demonstrate greater demand for locally produced honey, especially when provided information about negative aspects of internationally produced honey that include adulteration. This shows that such negative media attention on specialty products offers small producers an opportunity to increase profitability by marketing themselves as a specialized niche alternative.     

Consumer Ownership in Liberalized Electricity Markets. The Case of Denmark

The continuation of consumer ownership has been an important part of the Danish electricity reform from 1999. Consumer ownership refers to either a consumer co-operative or a municipal utility. Contrary to conventional wisdom, consumer ownership can be supported by solid arguments from modern economic theory of organization. These arguments are presented and confronted with both present and future situation in Denmark. The development of the electricity supply industry after the Second World War has emptied consumer ownership of much of its original content. Nowadays, most consumers consider their electric utility as the (monopoly) supplier of a good they demand and not as something they own. Therefore, obligatory consumer ownership as specified in the new Danish Electricity Act of 1999 cannot be relied on to guarantee security of supply and reasonable prices for small consumers     

基于农产品质量安全的技术扩散博弈分析

在有限理性的假设下,本文采用演化博弈论方法,分析了生产者之间、生产者和消费者之间以及生产者和政府监管部门之间相互作用时的策略选择行为,揭示出经济利益是影响质量安全技术扩散的主要内在因素。因此,若要遏制不安全技术行为的发生,一是要减少生产者的违规收益,严厉处罚并提高其生产成本;二是引导消费者增加对安全农产品的需求;三是加强对监管者的再规制,提高其监测能力、监管频率等。     

From Segmented Markets to Integrated Markets: an Analysis of Economic Integration and Antidumping Legislation

The paper examines how a movement from segmented markets to integrated markets affects the volume of trade, consumer prices, profits and welfare in a monopoly model. The monopolist can initially discriminate consumer prices among markets with trade costs but has to take arbitrage into account as economic integration proceeds. The analysis provides interesting insights into economic integration and antidumping law. It is shown that the extent of arbitrage and the shape of the marginal cost curve play crucial roles. Surprisingly, it is possible that neither consumers nor the monopolist gains from economic integration, and that antidumping legislation benefits consumers at the expense of producers.     

Consumer preferences and employment discrimination

Many American managers are under increasing pressure to base hiring and other employment decisions on consumers' preferences. This study attempts, in exploratory fashion, to identify traits of in-person service workers (IPSWs) that are preferred by consumers and could serve as the basis for employment discrimination. Preliminary results indicate that consumers do have strongly held preferences when a transaction involves significant customer-worker interaction. Females appear to be a more likely source of consumer-based discrimination than males for high involvement purchases. Briefly discussed is the question of whether consumers have stereotypical beliefs about IPSWs as well as the implications of these beliefs.     

The Formation of Consumer Inflationary Expectations in Australia*

This paper analyzes the quantitative price expectations of consumers as obtained from consumer surveys. Price expectations are considered as functions of (i) past rates of inflation (ii) other economic variables, and (iii) consumer sentiment variables. The dominant influence on expectations is the most recent change in the consumer price index. Wage-indexation decisions and changes in the money supply also exert a significant influence on mean expectations. The variability of price expectations across consumers is proportional to the mean level of expectations.     

Consumer myopia, standardization and aftermarket monopolization

In this paper, I show that the standard Bertrand competition argument does not apply when firms compete for myopic consumers who optimize period-by-period. I develop the model in the context of aftermarket. With overlapping-generations of consumers, simultaneous product offerings in the primary market and aftermarket establishes a price floor for the primary good. This constraint prevents aftermarket rents from being dissipated by the primary market competition. Duopoly firms earn positive profits despite price competition with undifferentiated products. Nonetheless, government interventions to reinforce aftermarket competition such as a standardization requirement may lead to the partial collapse of the primary market.     

Economic sociology: a historical perspective

In this paper we briefly recall what is meant by economic sociology, basing our definition principally on the works of R. Swedberg and M. Cranovetter. We then focus on the questions and problematics which are more particularly relevant to the history of economic and sociological thought in such a way as to make explicit the kind of past in relation to which economic sociology is most pertinent. We shall thus be induced to correct certain explanations and to propose a slightly different perspective on the origin of economic sociology. This historical work enables us to formulate a definition of economic sociology based on two key concepts - economic institution and economic action - and allows us to articulate what economic sociology actually is, rather than merely describing what it is not. Finally, we show that these propositions are not without interest in relation to the present-day economic sociology that tends to go by the name - made fasionable by Granovetter and Swedberg - of ‘New Economic Sociology.’     

风险度量的经济学理性与风险度量方法比较

本文引入风险度量的经济学理性概念:一种风险度量方法为经济学理性的是指,这种方法对风险的度量结果与经济学中理性人对风险的排序结果相一致,采用这种方法度量风险的决策者,其决策结果也是经济学理性的。本文从风险状态下的决策理论出发,论证了在银行监管问题上,经济学理性的风险度量方法需要满足的条件。结合银行资本充足率监管的演进趋势,比较了几种重要的风险度量方法,并提出了一种经济学理性的、符合银行监管需要的风险度量方法。     

美国信用消费法律制度及其对中国的启示

美国作为世界上信用消费制度最发达的国家之一,其信用消费立法一直备受关注。2009年的《金融改革方案》虽然确立了消费者保护的目标,但也给经济发展带来了更大的不确定性。在信用消费立法联邦化的趋势下,州立法实施更为严格的消费者保护标准受到联邦优先权的重压,也从实质上削弱了对金融消费者的保护力度。中国应当借鉴美国信用消费制度,确立政府的监管目标和价值取向,以国家立法和地方立法相结合作为主要立法模式,完善信息披露制度并建立完备的信用评估体系,设立专门的信用消费者保护机构,以更好地维护消费者权益。     

Religion,economics and politics: The Bishops and Keynes in the post-Keynesian ERA

This paper makes a proposal for reintroducing sociological or social economics into contemporary economic science. Such a reintroduction is proposed to be substantive, by analyzing the social structuring of the economy, and formal, by including sociological/social economics in the current (JEL) classification system of economic disciplines (code A.15). Both epistemological and ontological arguments can be presented to support the proposal. Epistemological arguments invoke the presence of essential components of sociological economics in the development of economic thought, and ontological arguments stress the role of social factors in economic life. In this paper I present primarily epistemological (theoretical-methodological) arguments for sociological economics, and secondarily ontological ones. I show that the present designation, sociology of economics, is something different from sociological or social economics in that the former refers to economic epistemology (knowledge) and the latter to economic ontology (reality). I conclude that, in addition to a sociology of economic science, we need a sociology of economic life.     

Consumer attitudes toward low stake risk in food markets

Consistency of quality is viewed as important for producers of consumer goods. However, there is no literature testing the importance of quality consistency on consumers’ willingness to pay for consumer goods. We use an experimental auction market to investigate how inconsistency in tenderness affects consumers’ willingness to pay for beef. We find that most consumers are risk averse with respect to sensory quality. Both the average tenderness and the variance of tenderness affected the consumers’ willingness to pay for beef. Reducing the uncertainty of the sensory quality by categorizing the beef into three tenderness classes increased the total value of the beef by 8%.     

Consumer perception,information provision,and regulation of insurance markets

Available evidence shows that consumers overinsure against modest risks. For instance, a majority of consumers tend to choose too low a level of deductible for homeowners insurance and automobile insurance, and purchase excessive warranties for electronics and other durable products such as automobiles and furniture. The analysis demonstrates that overinsurance decreases consumer welfare and increases insurers’ profits. This tendency of overinsurance stems from lack of information about the probability and magnitude of loss, and it calls for policies that require insurers or third-party organizations to provide more, albeit not perfect, information and data for consumers before they make insurance-purchase decisions. The implications of the analysis for other financial products such as stocks and deposits are discussed.     

On Rationality,Ideal Types and Economics: Alfred Schüutz and the Austrian School

A comparison is made of the views on economic theory and method of the Austrian philosopher and sociologist Alfred Schütz (1899–1959) and those of his mentor, the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises (1881–1973). Schütz basically agreed with the fundamental parts of the Austrian program, but he also had disagreements with Mises on the epistemological character of the core assumptions, on the formulation and status of the rationality principle, and on the use of ideal types in economic analysis. In several of these aspects Schütz had important points of value not only for the use of ideal types in economic modeling, but also within political science and sociology. In the end, however, there is more which unites than separates Schütz and Mises.     

Consumer search with asymmetric price sampling

We explore asymmetries in the way consumers sample prices in a simple sequential search framework. In equilibrium, the price distribution of a firm catering to more local consumers first-order stochastically dominates that of its rival. Prices rise in the degree of asymmetry.     

Consumer choice and information : New experimental evidence

Many laws and regulations aimed at safeguarding consumers deal with the amount and kind of product information that consumers receive. Implicit in these regulations is the belief that consumers can make use of the appropriate information, provided only that it is made available. Recently a number of authors have argued that consumer decisionmaking is subject to consistent biases, suggesting poor purchase decisions may result even with access to the relevant information. Indeed some critics have argued that consumers may be subject to information overload so that they may make worse decisions with extra information than without it. The experimental results presented in this paper address some of these issues. The results suggest that untrained people can use simplifying strategies in quite complicated decision problems. Also, while information overload clearly can occur, the subjects in our experiments appeared able to ignore unnecessary or unwanted information.     

The fiscal sociology of Gino Borgatta: Pareto, extra-economic redistribution and economic growth

The purpose of this study is to establish the extent to whichBorgatta's early fiscal sociology is consistent with, and differentfrom, Vilfredo Pareto's critical views on fiscal theory. Particularemphasis is given to the treatment of the relationship between‘extra-economic’ redistribution, achieved throughfiscal measures, and economic growth. Since evidence of Pareto'sinfluence is much weaker in Borgatta's more mature studies,the ‘definitive’ Paretian fiscal sociology thatemerged in his early ‘Lo Studio Scientifico dei FenomeniFinanziari’ is investigated for possible indications ofwhy Borgatta did not subsequently develop fiscal studies furtheralong Paretian lines.     

行为经济学中的公平互惠——和谐社会的经济理论基础

基于理性经济人假说的传统经济学认为,经济行为主体是单纯地追求个人利益最大化的。这在一定程度上强化了社会经济关系中的矛盾和冲突,不利于构建和谐社会。建立在行为经济学基础上的公平互惠理论,强调了有限理性的经济行为主体之间的公平、互惠与合作,这正是构建和谐社会的内在要求。因此,公平、互惠与合作是和谐社会的经济要素。而且,基于行为经济学的公平互惠理论为构建和谐社会提供了微观经济理论基础,并可依据这一理论对和谐社会进行机制设计或制度安排。