Search

Price promotion is an effective way to capture market share, as consumer sensitivity to price is universal. Yet, consumer satisfaction with services‐such as logistics‐plays a critical role. Deep price discounts can indeed spike demand, but they can also congest systems, thus prolonging delivery times and diminishing consumer satisfaction. Despite observed significant effects of logistics capacity on consumer and firm payoffs in logistics systems in recent years, economic and operational analysis of these effects remains under explored. This study theoretically examines the influence of logistics capacity on competition between two firms using a refined Hotelling model that incorporates system congestion via a BPR‐type congestion function. Our primary findings include: First, the possibility of multiple equilibria emerges with intermediate product values, fueled by either unilateral price reductions to seize greater market share or price increases to enhance marginal benefits. Moreover, a firm with superior logistics capacity may not always set higher prices at equilibrium. Second, we show that equilibrium pricing exhibits a non‐monotonic relationship with logistics capacity and market size. Lastly, we scrutinize firms' long‐term strategic reactions to changes in logistics capacity and the implications of marginal capacity costs, symmetric or otherwise. Our findings provide the following insights. We caution that the equilibrium pricing strategy is ambiguous when the product value is not extreme because both firms are more likely to engage in random price wars. Intriguingly, while augmenting logistics capacity might elevate service satisfaction, it could paradoxically reduce firm revenue or consumer surplus. Our analysis also indicates that higher marginal capacity costs could, counter intuitively, benefit firms or consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers a supply chain that consists of a manufacturer and a retailer, who concern their respective profits as well as consumer welfare. Each firm's objective is modelled as a weighted sum of its profit and consumer surplus, with the weight on consumer surplus representing the concern level of the firm. We first examine a push supply chain where the manufacturer determines the wholesale price and the retailer determines the order quantity. We derive the optimal decisions and investigate the impact of the firms' consumer surplus consideration on the interactive decisions of the supply chain members and the overall performance of the supply chain. We show that a higher level of retailer's consumer concern does not necessarily lead to higher consumer surplus because her concern on consumers may be exploited by the manufacturer to improve his objective; and the manufacturer's concern on consumers may not benefit the retailer in terms of her profit, especially when the manufacturer's concern level is relatively low. Nevertheless, compared to the for‐profit supply chain, concern on consumer surplus could be beneficial to both firms' profits as well as consumer surplus, inducing a "win‐win‐win" situation under certain conditions. Furthermore, as a social planner, the government seeks to optimize social welfare by adopting subsidy policies, and we examine two types of intervention policies, that is, subsidizing firms and subsidizing consumers. We show that when subsidizing firms, government's quantity‐based subsidy is always more cost‐effective than sales‐based subsidy. As the firms' concern levels become higher or the demand uncertainty becomes lower, subsidizing consumers can achieve higher social welfare than subsidizing firms. Moreover, we examine the impact of the government's budget constraint and concern level on consumer surplus, and extend the analysis to a pull supply chain to show the robustness of the major findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses two central questions in markets with adverse selection: How does information impact the welfare of market participants (sellers and buyers)? Also, what is the optimal information disclosure policy and how is it affected by the planner's relative welfare weight on sellers' surplus versus consumers' surplus? We find that as a result of improved information, prices become more strongly associated with the true quality of sellers and, thus, more dispersed. This will result in higher total surplus. Furthermore, we find that better information has opposing welfare effects on consumers and producers that could lead to limited disclosure depending on the social objective and market characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates asymmetric price transmission (APT) in the rice market in Bangladesh using monthly price series at farm, wholesale, and retail levels from October 2005 to June 2017 in a nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model (NARDL). The results indicate a significant asymmetric relationship across price at retail, wholesale, and farm levels in the long and short term. While wholesalers/millers benefit from the imperfect price transmission at the expense of farmers, retailers gain over wholesalers/millers. We find that the consumer surplus decreases from a price rise at the wholesale or farm level, but consumers do not enjoy a proportional increase in their surplus from a price reduction. The study reveals that the consumer welfare loss due to APT along the rice value chain of Bangladesh is equivalent to US$89.05 million per month. This estimated aggregate welfare loss requires both the attention of decision‐makers and corrective actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A nationwide recreational fishing survey in Sweden was used to estimate the benefits of recreational fishing in Sweden. The survey targeted the Swedish population and, consequently, the sample contained a large fraction of zero fishing days. To consider this, a zero‐inflated Poisson model was used in the estimations. Swedes fished about 15.6 million days in 2013, of which two‐thirds were spent on inland fishing, and one‐third on marine and coastal fishing. Expected consumer surplus per fishing day varied with the season; SEK 193 for winter fishing, SEK 787 for summer fishing and SEK 95 for autumn fishing. Although about 70 per cent of total fishing days were spent on inland fishing, the weighted consumer surplus per fishing day in marine and coastal areas were higher. The results also demonstrated strong positive effects of increases in expected catch per day on number of fishing days demanded and consumer surplus, which have important implications for fishery policies directed at recreational fishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analytically examines the demand for surgical masks following the recent health precautions due to coronavirus. Using a simple linear demand curve and alternatively examining the impacts of requirements that mandate (a) the wearing of masks by frontline workers; (b) suggested but not required masking by the whole public; and (c) compulsory masking by the whole public. The impacts of the different scenarios on the price elasticity of demand are determined along with the slope (or the rate of change) of elasticity. Some of these results differ when a non‐linear demand curve is considered instead. The equilibrium mask prices increase when masks are universally mandated, whereas the consumer surplus is higher when masks are recommended but not mandated. However, the ranking of consumer surplus is shown to be sensitive to the supply elasticity of masks. These considerations enable a structured means to view the demand implications of masking requirements and provide some food for policy thought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an era of pressure on government resources, nonprofits can serve an important role in the provision of services to the public. However, without clear and quantifiable estimates of their impact, it is difficult for policymakers to justify allocating governmental resources toward these services. This is especially the case for ephemeral opportunities that arise without substantial advance notice or a special program that occurs only once (contrasted to programs that nonprofits provide on a continuing basis). This research note presents economic impact estimates for a unique example of a remarkable effort involving numerous entities from the government, for‐profit, and nonprofit sectors. Our contribution is to exemplify methods that might be used to assess the economic impact of ephemeral or one‐time events. Of course, each situation is unique, so the judgment of the analyst is always a key input. Using three survey‐generated data points per respondent, nonprofits can replicate the methods of this study to assess the economic impact of special events herein. With estimates such as the ones examined herein, policymakers can contrast the benefits of special events with their costs in order to determine if such events are worthwhile investments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Remanufacturing has been recognized both in literature and practice because of its greenness and cost saving. Since the reproduction processes could be affected by uncertain factors, remanufacturing is much more complex than producing new products. To investigate how yield uncertainty and market competition affect remanufacturing decisions, we compare the results under three classical market scenarios with random yield, that is, (a) Nash–Cournot, (b) monopoly, and (c) Stackelberg–Cournot. On comparing the expected remanufacturing scale, expected profit, and consumer surplus, it shows that as the number of remanufacturers increases, the planned collection quantity of a single remanufacturer decreases, while the total expected market output increases. Furthermore, we find that the largest expected profit and expected consumer surplus brought by market scenarios depend on a threshold remanufacturer number. We also relax the assumptions and extend our model to consider the scenario of m leaders and n−m followers in a Stackelberg game. It is interesting to find that the first‐mover advantage in profit and market share of the leader remanufacturer would be challenged when the number of leader remanufacturers is no less than 2. The results can be potentially useful for managerial decisions and environmental administrations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is usually believed that the presence of labour unions is detrimental for the consumers since it raises wages. We show that this view may not be true if we endogenize the impacts of labour unions on firms' corporate strategies such as merger and acquisition. The presence of labour unions may benefit the consumers by deterring merger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine optimal price ceilings when the regulator is uncertain about demand and maximizes expected consumer surplus. With perfect competition, if regulatory uncertainty is large enough, then softer intervention is called for, with the price ceiling set at a relatively high level compared with a full information scenario. In an imperfectly competitive setting where symmetric firms compete in supply functions, with large enough uncertainty, the optimal ceiling increases with the degree of competition, so greater competitive pressure justifies less restrictive regulation. Under perfect competition, we also determine a cut‐off level of rationing efficiency below which a price ceiling should not be used. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biodiversity needs our attention because humans receive a wide range of direct and indirect benefits. Valuation of biodiversity is important to establish the importance of use and non‐use values of biological resources and cost of ignoring them. Against this backdrop, the aim of this study is to capture the recreational value of the national park biodiversity while employing travel cost method. To this end, the value of the economic benefits generated by sustainable management of Dachigam National Park in Jammu and Kashmir (India) is estimated using data from 301 visitors from different parts of the country. Data are analysed using count data models, and results reveal that travel cost method is suitable for valuation of various use values generated by environmental resources such as national parks. Estimated results show that consumer surplus per visitor per visit in present study is equal to Rs. 12,470 (US$197), which translates into an annual monetary recreational value of about Rs. 247,614,828 (approximately US$3,930,395). Demand for tourism services is also found to be fairly insensitive to travel cost/price. Therefore, an increase in entry fee and redistribution of proceeds can improve the physical and financial management of the park. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ridesharing's phenomenal growth has been fueled by a combination of efficiency gains through technological innovation and disregard for current taxi regulations. The end effect has been the generation of significant consumer surplus, but at what social cost? This dialogue piece debates whether ridesharing services have been good or bad for Canadian cities and then reviews current regulatory status in Toronto and Vancouver. Key Messages: Ridesharing, and Uber specifically, has experienced phenomenal growth in the last five years, which has upended the taxi industry in Canadian cities.Zwick argues that ridesharing has been detrimental to Canadian cities because it compromises safety standards, increases precarious labour, and intensifies congestion.Spicer argues that ridesharing has been a positive for Canadian cities because it generates consumer surplus, creates new employment opportunities, and disrupts a broken market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores a monopolist's optimal multi-tier quantity-discount prices and shows that only the last tier's marginal cost is relevant in determining the tier prices and each tier's price is equal to its preceding tier's marginal revenue. An increase in total output is associated with larger individual tiers' own and cumulative outputs (the stretching effect), and the increases in their cumulative outputs are smaller if their tiers are closer to the first one (the ripple effect). The pricing structure is further characterized by the tier Lerner indices and the price elasticities defined on individual tiers' own and their commutative outputs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we examine heterogeneity in the trip preferences of recreationists. We apply a random parameters negative binomial model and a latent class negative binomial model to a panel dataset of beach users at a site on the west coast of Ireland, where access across farmland has been restricted. This approach allows us to account for heterogeneity with respect to the impact of the chosen explanatory variables in a contingent behaviour travel cost model of demand where the researcher must also account for the fact that the sample data has been collected on-site. The analysis also develops individual consumer surplus estimates and finds that estimates are systematically affected by both the random parameter and latent class specifications. There is also evidence that accounting for individual heterogeneity improves the statistical fit of the models and provides a more informative description of the drivers of recreationalist trip behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

'Social savings' is a cliometric concept to measure the benefit to society of technological improvements. The terms are defined, and the relationship between social savings and consumer surplus, total factor productivity and growth accounting measures is discussed. We critically outline Fogel's original application of social savings to American railroads in 1890, before looking at subsequent uses of the concept, both to other transport improvements and to other technological changes more generally. The paper concludes by setting out areas to which social savings could be applied, as well as setting out guidelines that future economic historians should use when applying the technique, in order to maximize the likely usefulness of any such work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under the principle of the failing firm defence a merger that would be blocked due to its harmful effect on competition could be nevertheless allowed when (i) the acquired firm is actually failing, (ii) there is no less anticompetitive alternative offer of purchase, (iii) absent the merger, the assets to be acquired would exit the market. We focus on potential anticompetitive effects of a myopic application of the requirement (iii) by studying consequences of a horizontal merger on entry in a Cournot oligopoly with a failing firm. Entry is deterred if the merger is cleared and, when the industry is highly concentrated, consumer welfare is higher under a prohibition because long-run gains due to augmented competition exceed short-run losses due to shortage of output. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper integrates several areas of the literature by more fully developing the linkage between demand estimates and the welfare effects of food labels and bans for three common survey/experimental approaches used to elicit consumer preferences. We present empirical applications related to beef cloning and methylmercury in fish where, for the same data sets, we compare each value elicitation approach in terms of the consumer surplus changes that result from two regulations. Welfare measures vary significantly across the three methodologies, but the sign of the welfare change is invariant across method. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, estimates of value for recreational fishing are reported for three major freshwater impoundments in Queensland, Australia, using both travel cost and contingent valuation methods. Policy analysts often require estimates of value when analysing the importance of recreation against other uses of impoundments, or when considering the potential for further investments, such as with fish stocking programs. Different forms of the travel cost method are used to estimate separate consumer surpluses associated with two key subgroups of recreational anglers: frequent and occasional anglers. A contingent valuation study is used to estimate the marginal values associated with a potential improvement in fishing experience. The results of the travel cost analysis provide strong evidence that recreational values vary between different groups of anglers and across sites, while the contingent valuation estimates provide values for additional marginal benefits of recreational angling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An analysis of the annual costs of weeds in seven winter crops across Australia demonstrated that the most important 15 weed species cause substantial annual costs in both financial and economic terms. Using survey data captured over the 1998–1999 growing season, the financial cost of these weeds in seven crops was estimated to be AU$1,182 million. The main components of this cost were herbicides (AU$571 million), the competitive effects of residual weeds (AU$380 million), and tillage (AU$206 million) while weed contamination of grain was a minor cost (AU$25 million). Across all regions, the most economically important weeds were annual ryegrass, wild oats, and wild radish, although there were regional differences in importance. An economic surplus analysis determined the annual economic cost of weeds in annual winter crops to be AU$1,279 million. This surplus loss represented 17% of the gross value of Australian grain and oilseed production in 1998–1999. Australian grain producers incurred a major loss, with a reduction in producer surplus of AU$1,047 million. Australian grain consumers had a large consumer surplus loss (AU$229 million), while international consumers suffered a small loss and international grain producers gained a small producer surplus from the higher grain prices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides a graphical explanation for one of the most important restrictions to utility functions used in revealed preference approaches for measuring the demand for public goods and product quality—weak complementarity. It also describes how the Willig condition is an important element along with weak complementarity in measuring Hicksian consumer surplus for changes in public goods or quality using Marshallian demand curves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Past recreation studies have noted that on-site or visitor intercept surveys are subject to over-sampling of avid users (i.e., endogenous stratification) and have offered econometric solutions to correct for this. However, past papers do not estimate the empirical magnitude of the bias in benefit estimates with a real data set, nor do they compare the corrected estimates to benefit estimates derived from a population sample. This paper empirically examines the magnitude of the recreation benefits per trip bias by comparing estimates from an on-site river visitor intercept survey to a household survey. The difference in average benefits is quite large, with the on-site visitor survey yielding $24 per day trip, while the household survey yields $9.67 per day trip. A simple econometric correction for endogenous stratification in our count data model lowers the benefit estimate to $9.60 per day trip, a mean value nearly identical and not statistically different from the household survey estimate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]