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1.
Against the backcloth of EU regulation, this note looks at the “politics of necessity” regarding electricity provision in
Germany. Electricity as a case is chosen because its provision has been undergoing a profound process of liberalisation and
deregulation, and there is a considerable amount of experience with the chances and pitfalls of liberalisation in this sector.
Secondly, electricity is a network industry and a natural monopoly subject to systematic market failure, which calls for regulation.
The paper starts out with a closer look at the consumer as an actor in the regulation process, proposing a three-role model
of the consumer as a market player, as a citizen, and as a micro-producer in households and networks. In these roles, consumers
take on different social and political identities; they are affected differently by (de)regulation of essential services and
have different options for reacting to quality and price issues. It then describes the legal state and the development of
deregulation in the electricity sector in Germany. Selected empirical data are presented, and consumer policy implications
are drawn. 相似文献
2.
Sustainable consumer behaviour—behaviour motivated or influenced by social and/or environmental considerations—is an important
topic in public policy and consumer psychology. Research on the antecedents of sustainable consumer behaviour has found a
robust “gender effect”: women are more likely than men to express concern about consumption’s broader impacts and to act upon
those concerns. The mechanisms underlying the gender effect have not been well elucidated. At the same time, more limited
research has found that sustainable consumer behaviour is also influenced by personality: more agreeable and more open consumers
are more likely to place importance on and to act on social and environmental concerns. Separate research in personality psychology
has shown that women tend to be more agreeable than men. The authors integrate these findings to propose and test a model
in which personality mediates the effect of sex on sustainable consumer behaviour. The personality differences mediating this
effect are the same ones elsewhere subsumed within “gender” differences. Our findings clarify the mechanisms underlying the
observed sex effect, confirm the utility of personality constructs in clarifying differences in consumer attitudes and behaviours,
and have compelling implications for public policy. 相似文献
3.
Gerhard Raab Christian E. Elger Michael Neuner Bernd Weber 《Journal of Consumer Policy》2011,34(4):401-413
The following article describes a study of the neural correlates of compulsive buying. Twenty-six non-compulsive (“normal”)
and 23 compulsive buyers were measured using functional magnetic resonance imaging while performing purchasing decisions.
The compulsive buyers were selected based on strict criteria, such that they were all undergoing psychotherapeutic treatment
due to their buying behaviour. The results show evidence of significant differences between non-compulsive and compulsive
buyers regarding brain activity in regions known to be involved in decision making. The findings give a deeper insight into
the nature of compulsive buying and are relevant to consumer policy. 相似文献
4.
In this paper we use Nielsen scanner panel data on four categories of consumer goods to examine how TV advertising and other
marketing activities affect the demand curve facing a brand. Advertising can affect consumer demand in many different ways.
Becker and Murphy (Quarterly Journal of Economics 108:941–964, 1993) have argued that the “presumptive case” should be that
advertising works by raising marginal consumers’ willingness to pay for a brand. This has the effect of flattening the demand curve, thus increasing the equilibrium
price elasticity of demand and the lowering the equilibrium price. Thus, “advertising is profitable not because it lowers
the elasticity of demand for the advertised good, but because it raises the level of demand.” Our empirical results support
this conjecture on how advertising shifts the demand curve for 17 of the 18 brands we examine. There have been many prior
studies of how advertising affects two equilibrium quantities: the price elasticity of demand and/or the price level. Our
work is differentiated from previous work primarily by our focus on how advertising shifts demand curves as a whole. As Becker and Murphy pointed out, a focus on equilibrium prices or elasticities alone can be quite misleading. Indeed, in
many instances, the observation that advertising causes prices to fall and/or demand elasticities to increase, has misled
authors into concluding that consumer “price sensitivity” must have increased, meaning the number of consumers’ willing to
pay any particular price for a brand was reduced—perhaps because advertising makes consumers more aware of substitutes. But,
in fact, a decrease in the equilibrium price is perfectly consistent with a scenario where advertising actually raises each
individual consumer’s willingness to pay for a brand. Thus, we argue that to understand how advertising affects consumer price
sensitivity one needs to estimate how it shifts the whole distribution of willingness to pay in the population. This means
estimating how it shifts the shape of the demand curve as a whole, which in turn means estimating a complete demand system for all brands in a category—as we do here. We estimate demand systems
for toothpaste, toothbrushes, detergent and ketchup. Across these categories, we find one important exception to conjecture
that advertising should primarily increase the willingness to pay of marginal consumers. The exception is the case of Heinz
ketchup. Heinz advertising has a greater positive effect on the WTP of infra-marginal consumers. This is not surprising, because
Heinz advertising focuses on differentiating the brand on the “thickness” dimension. This is a horizontal dimension that may
be highly valued by some consumers and not others. The consumers who most value this dimension have the highest WTP for Heinz,
and, by focusing on this dimension; Heinz advertising raises the WTP of these infra-marginal consumers further. In such a
case, advertising is profitable because it reduces the market share loss that the brand would suffer from any given price
increase. In contrast, in the other categories we examine, advertising tends to focus more on vertical attributes.
相似文献
Baohong SunEmail: |
5.
Chris Willett 《Journal of Consumer Policy》2010,33(3):247-273
This article analyses the unfairness concept from the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCPD). It considers why the nature
and level of protection is particularly important given the range of coverage of the regime and the Europeanisation agenda.
It argues that the UCPD concept provides the potential for a relatively protective approach to consumer decision making. At
the same time, it emphasizes that realisation of this potential is partly dependent on recognizing the limits of transparency
as a protective tool and in understanding the “professional diligence” and “average consumer” concepts in particular ways.
It is further suggested that the protective potential of the regime is not necessarily undermined by the “average consumer”
concept or by the “informed decision-making” paradigm of the general unfairness clause. Indeed, the general clause may be
capable of extending the protective effects to some extent. Finally, it is suggested that regulators may have a key role to
play in maximizing both the level of protection and the prospects for a genuinely common European approach. 相似文献
6.
Stefanie Lena Heinzle 《Journal of Consumer Policy》2012,35(1):43-64
Consumers frequently act contrary to rational economic theory by overvaluing an initially higher purchase price while heavily
discounting future energy operating costs. One opportunity to help limit the scale of over-discounting is to fully disclose
the energy consumption of a product, e.g., by means of an energy label. However, not only the availability of information,
but also the way in which specific information about the energy consumption is framed, is likely to affect how individuals
discount future operating costs. A cost accuracy estimation experiment reveals that disclosing annual energy operating costs
for the product category of televisions might risk assisting consumers in realising that the possible energy operating cost
savings fall below initial estimates. A subsequent choice-based conjoint experiment shows that disclosing annual energy operating
costs thus affects consumers by causing them to discount future energy operating costs of a television more heavily than when
the information is disclosed in the form of “watts.” Owing to the power of the reversed “pennies-a-day” effect, disclosing
lifetime energy operating cost information, however, proves to be most effective in guiding consumers towards more energy-efficient
shopping behaviour. Implications for consumer policy and suggestions for future research are discussed. 相似文献
7.
Chinese “face,” as a complex social and psychological phenomenon, has attracted much attention from the fields of sociology
and psychology. However, in the field of consumer behavior, research about how mianzi (face) affects consumer behavior is lacking. Moreover, research on the connotations of sub-dimension of mianzi (face), that is, lian and mian as well as their influences on consumer behavior is seldom seen. Based on the grounded theory, using focus group interviews
and the self-report method, this study extracted scenario sentences of lian and mian, initially forming a preliminary scale with 14 positive items and 20 negative items concerning lian and mian. Moreover, by using close-ended questionnaire originated from previous grounded theory in terms of Chinese face, this study
validated the discrepancy between “mian” and “lian.” Besides the discrepancy between “mian” and “lian” also appeared in consumer perception about product category and country-of-origin image. 相似文献
8.
Based on consumer and manufacturer behaviors, this research describes local governments’ unique role in the process of “attracting
foreign direct investment (FDI)”. Drawing from a sample of 28 provinces plus four cities throughout China from 1998 to 2004,
we construct an econometric model in this paper to analyze the common factors that influenced the result of “attracting FDI”.
The main finding of this paper is that in the process of “attracting FDI”, local governments play a decisive role, which puts
consumer surplus, producer surplus and the other social welfare into a basket to construct its plan for “attracting FDI”.
The common factors which influence the result of “attracting FDI” are local costs, the number of foreign-invested company,
the market share of local companies, and the market share of foreign-invested companies.
Translate from Caimao Jingji 财贸经济 (Finance & Trade Economics), 2005, (12): 70–75 相似文献
9.
D. Ladkin 《Journal of Business Ethics》2006,65(1):87-98
This paper offers an alternative to deontological and utilitarian approaches to making ethical decisions and taking good actions
by organisational leaders. It argues that the relational and context-dependent nature of leadership necessitates reference
to an ethical approach which explicitly takes these aspects into account. Such an approach is offered in the re-conceptualisation
of ethical action on the part of leaders as a process of “coming into right relation” vis-à-vis those affected by their decisions
and actions. Heidegger’s notion of “dwelling” is explored as a means of “coming into right relation”. Three aspects of dwelling:
“staying with”, “comportment” and “active engagement” are described and ways in which they might be practically enacted by
leaders are suggested. The paper concludes by reflecting on the ways adopting a “dwelling” approach to resolving ethical issues
implies a re-conceptualisation of leadership itself. 相似文献
10.
Bahtışen Kavak Eda Gürel Canan Eryiğit Öznur Özkan Tektaş 《Journal of Business Ethics》2009,88(1):115-135
This study investigates the possible effects of self-concept, self-monitoring, and moral development level on dimensions of
consumers’ ethical attitudes. “Actively benefiting from illegal activities,” “actively benefiting from deceptive practices,”
and “no harm/no foul 1–2” are defined by factor analysis as four dimensions of Turkish consumers’ ethical attitudes. Logistic
regression analysis is applied to data collected from 516 Turkish households. Results indicate that self-monitoring and moral
development level predicted consumer ethics in relation to “actively benefiting from questionable practices” and “no harm/no
foul” dimensions. Actual self-concept is also a predictor variable in relation to “no harm/no foul” dimension. Age and gender
make significant differences in consumers’ ethical attribute dimensions. 相似文献
11.
This paper presents a nonlinear modeling of market response between advertising stock and direct utility with heterogeneous
parameters using single-source data. We examine advertising threshold effects and measure the effective advertising stock at the individual consumer level. Two kinds of information, i.e., TV advertising
exposure data and consumer’s purchase history data, are combined for the modeling. The former is used for constructing advertising
stock over calendar time via heterogeneous carryover parameters and the latter is applied to the choice model. The Markov
chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method is applied to estimate these heterogeneous parameters. Compared to other possible nonlinear
specifications, it is shown that the proposed threshold utility function model with discontinuity at the threshold performs
better than other smooth market response models. The empirical results support the existence of an advertising threshold and
suggest the pulsing or “on/off” policy for our datasets. In terms of the effective reach, implying the reach after suspending the ad exposure to investigate how it is damping out for a possible “on/off” advertising
policy, the optimal “off” interval was measured to be quite short to support a high-frequency pulsing policy, because the
carryover parameter as well as the difference of ad stock and threshold are not large enough for our datasets.
相似文献
12.
Jeremy Galbreath 《Journal of Business Ethics》2011,104(3):421-432
Most studies on climate change response have examined reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Yet these studies do not
take into account ecosystem services constraints and biophysical disruptions wrought by climate change that may require broader
types of response. By studying a firm in the wine industry and using a research approach not constrained by structured methodologies
or biased toward GHG emissions, the findings suggest that both “inside out” and “outside in” actions are taken in response
to climate change. While attempts are made by the firm to curtail and reverse climate change through management of carbon
emissions, evidence suggests a clear pattern of actions designed to adjust to the adverse consequences of climate change as
well. The results both confirm and extend previous findings and suggest that the level and breadth of response to climate
change is shaped by situated attention, structural controls, and industry type. 相似文献
13.
Business Ethics Index: Measuring Consumer Sentiments Toward Business Ethical Practices 总被引:1,自引:0,他引:1
The present study describes the development of an ongoing and systematic index to measure consumers’ sentiments towards business
ethical practices. The Business Ethics Index (BEI) is based on the well established measurements of consumer sentiments, namely
the ICS (Index of Consumer Sentiment) and CBCCI (Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index). The BEI is comprised of 4 measurements
representing the dimensions of “personal-vicarious” and “past-future.” Data from 503 telephone interviews were used to calculate
a BEI of 107. This indicates an overall positive consumer sentiment towards the ethical behavior of business. Future calculations
of the BEI are planned which will allow for the estimation of the latent dynamics of trends in consumer sentiments toward
American business ethics. 相似文献
14.
The Paradigm of Knowledge-Oriented Industrial Policy 总被引:1,自引:1,他引:0
Rumen Dobrinsky 《Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade》2009,9(4):273-305
The paper attempts to synthesize some of the outcomes of the evolution of thinking on industrial policy in the knowledge-based
economy and the related advances in policy practice. The term “knowledge-oriented industrial policy” is used in the paper
to denote a new brand of public sector interventions targeting various structural aspects of the economy through transmission
channels and mechanisms that hinge on the driving forces of knowledge flows and stocks and incorporating a systemic understanding
of the policy rationale. The paper outlines the theoretical background, the rationale and the operational framework as well
as the design of knowledge-oriented industrial policy whose nature is highlighted by drawing attention to the distinctions
between “traditional” and “knowledge-oriented” approaches and instruments. A simplified taxonomy of different categories of
knowledge-oriented policy instruments is also presented in the paper. The specific features and effectiveness of these policy
instruments are discussed by highlighting their knowledge functions, the policy transmission channels as well as other important
characteristics. 相似文献
15.
As consumer use of information and communication technology (ICT) products grows, the importance of ICT standards in consumer
markets also grows. While standards for manufactured products were once developed at the national level in formal standards
bodies, standards for ICT products today are more likely to be developed by informal standards bodies that target global markets,
creating new challenges for national consumer protection laws. As part of the process of creating a single market, the EU
developed an innovative and successful form of “coregulation” known as the “New Approach” that coordinated the work of legislators
and standards developers to reduce technical barriers to trade in the internal market. In order to protect consumer interests
in markets for ICT products effectively, another “New Approach” is needed to coordinate the work of global ICT standard-developing
organizations with the goals of national and regional consumer protection laws, but the institutional challenges facing such
a strategy are daunting. The French DADVSI legislation represents progress in this direction; further progress may be possible
by adopting “better regulation” strategies.
相似文献
Nicolas JondetEmail: |
16.
Raphael L'Hoest 《Intereconomics》2001,36(1):44-50
The economic performance of the European Union has taken on a new dimension in regard to the emerging “digital economy”. Usually,
it is argued that the EU lags behind the United States in most aspects of the use and diffusion of information and communication
technologies (ICT). This paper argues that there are serious challenges confronting the EU in dealing with the digital economy,
especially in respect to education issues, consumer confidence and the avoidance of a “digital divide”. On the other hand
it is pointed out that there has been tremendous progress in respect to the economic significance of electronic commerce,
the development of (self-)regulatory mechanims and the creation of a modern policy framework.
The content of this article is entirely the responsibility of the author and does not necessarily reflect the views of the
BMWi or any EU institution. 相似文献
17.
With the proliferation of regional trade agreements since the late 1980s and early 1990s, preferential rules of origin have
also proliferated. The discussion on these rules has gradually shifted from a purely technical discussion (“how to establish
the origin of goods not wholly obtained in one country”, and hence, “how to apply trade preferences in these cases”) to a
wider discussion also touching upon the transaction costs caused by having a “spaghetti bowl” of rules, and the actual or
presumed neo-protectionist use that is being made of them. In the context of the discussion on possible policy options for
developing countries simultaneously involved in (or negotiating) regional and multilateral trade agreements, this article
will first give a brief overview of the findings of the recent empirical literature. Some indications are then presented as
to what such policy options could look like.
This paper was first presented at the Ad-hoc Expert Group Meeting on The Development Interface between the Multilateral Trading
System and Regional Trade Agreements, Session III Regulatory Provisions in RTAs, Palais des Nations, Geneva, 15-16 March 2007.
It is partly based on P. De Lombaerde, L. J. Garay : Preferential Rules of Origin: EU and NAFTA Regulatory Models and the
WTO, in: The Journal of World Investment & Trade, Vol. 6, No. 6, 2005, pp. 953-994; and L. J. Garay, P. De Lombaerde: Preferential
Rules of Origin: Models and Levels of Rulemaking, in: S. Woolcock (ed.): Trade and Investment Rulemaking: The Role of Regional
and Bilateral Agreements, Tokyo 2006, UNU Press, pp. 78-106. 相似文献
18.
Peter P. Swire 《Journal of Consumer Policy》2008,31(4):473-487
Since the 1960s, consumer protection law has been built on the contrast between large “producers” and small “consumers.” Today,
instead, an ordinary consumer owns what can accurately be called a “personal mainframe”—a home computer whose processing power
matches an IBM mainframe from about 10 Years ago. Equipped with a personal mainframe—an Information-Age factory—ordinary “consumers”
at home are increasingly also becoming “producers.” As unregulated consumers become regulated producers, a major legal question
is whether and when the individual should have to comply with consumer protection laws. The discussion here selects four examples
of US legal rules that might apply to consumers-as-producers, with recommendations spanning the range of possibilities: (1)
consumer privacy legislation: creating a threshold, with no compliance required for databases of fewer than 5,000 names, is
recommended; (2) advertising substantiation: concerning the requirement that advertisers have a “reasonable basis” for their
claims, applying current law to small advertisers is recommended; (3) spam: current law does not create a threshold for those
who send a few commercial emails, but such a threshold is worth considering; (4) political blogging: the author agrees with
the US Federal Election Commission decision to create a major exemption from campaign finance laws for online political advocacy,
even for large blogs or websites. The common theme among these recommendations is to describe the sort of harm that existing
law seeks to reduce. The approach here next looks at how the use of personal mainframes affects creation of those harms. Where
the sorts of harm are likely to be created by consumers-as-producers, the analysis tilts towards requiring compliance. Where
the sorts of harms are unlikely to be caused by consumers-as-producers, then the case for an exception is stronger.
相似文献
Peter P. SwireEmail: |
19.
Putting sustainable consumption into practice is a challenge that requires the effort and coordination of numerous societal
domains and actors. The paper deals with the contribution of policy making and policy evaluation. More specifically, it addresses
the question of how to evaluate the effectiveness of policy instruments dedicated to rendering household consumption more
sustainable. Despite the extensive literature on instrument effectiveness, sustainability assessment, and consumer behaviour,
only a few accounts deal with the specific characteristics and impacts of policy instruments for sustainable consumption.
Against this backdrop, a framework is suggested for the ex post analysis of effects resulting from such policy instruments.
Instrument effects include changes in consumption patterns (“outcomes”), subsequent changes in the state of the environment,
society and/or economy (“impacts”), and side effects. Step-by-step guidance is provided through the evaluation process. The
approach helps to assess the extent to which sustainable consumption policy instruments have achieved their stated goals,
but also encourages a critical reflection of these goals. In addition to evaluating instrument effects, the framework serves
to explain these effects. It does so on the basis of theoretically grounded hypotheses that tackle drivers of and barriers
to instrument effectiveness, thus exploring this relatively new policy field. Methodologically, a combination of qualitative
methods (narrative reconstruction) and quantitative methods (e.g., material flow analysis) is recommended to causally link
policies to changes in consumption patterns and impacts on sustainability. 相似文献
20.
Mark G. Nixon 《Journal of Business Ethics》2007,70(1):39-60
The economic theory of the consumer, which assumes individual satisfaction as its goal and individual freedom to pursue satisfaction
as its sine qua non, has become an important ideological element in political economy. Some have argued that the political dimension of economics
has evolved into a kind of “secular theology” that legitimates free market capitalism, which has become a kind of “religion”
in the United States [Nelson: 1991, Reaching for Heaven on Earth: The Theological Meaning of Economics. (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc, Savage, Maryland); 2001, Economics as Religion: From Samuelson to Chicago and Beyond (The Pennsylvania State University Press, University Park, Pennsylvania); Thurow: 1983, Dangerous Currents: The State of Economics (Random House, New York); Milbank: 1990, Theology and Social Theory, Beyond Secular Reason (Basil Blackwell, Cambridge, Massachusetts)]. Consumer theory in its ideological form provides an important base for this
religion and is no longer merely a positive framework for understanding consumer choice or estimating market demand. The paper
explores the view of the human being, the “anthropology,” that is implicit in the economic theory of the consumer and compares
its “theological” implications with the corresponding theological anthropologies in the Judaeo-Christian tradition. The paper
outlines the assumptions of consumer theory and then focuses on three aspects of the theory from a critical theological perspective:
the individual in community, property ownership, and human destiny (or “eschatology” in theological terminology). The principal
conclusion is that consumer theory, viewed from this perspective, leads to a reductionist and existentially harmful view of
human beings. The maximization of individual satisfaction raises genuine ethical issues when viewed as a political and religious
value. The paper argues that the issues could be ameliorated if economists would include more explicit treatment of a social
dimension and ethical alternatives in consumer theory and if theologians would give greater attention to economic theory.
Mark Nixon (mnixon@fordham.edu) is a doctoral student in theology and coordinator of the Master of Arts in Humanities & Sciences
Program at Fordham University, with research interests in postmodern theology, social theory, and ethics. He received his
B.A. (Religion) from Oberlin College, his M.B.A. and M.A. (Political Economy) from Stanford University, and his M.A. (Theology)
from Fordham University. He has also completed the course requirements for the Ph.D. (Economics) at The George Washington
University. His business career included more than 20 years with IBM where he held staff, management and executive positions,
including several years as director of IBM’s Advanced Business Institute. 相似文献