No abstract

Consumers respond positively to products tied to charity, particularly from sellers that are relatively new and hence have limited alternative means for assuring quality. We establish this result using data from a diverse group of eBay sellers who "experiment" with charity by varying the presence of a donation in a set of otherwise matched product listings. Most of charity's benefits accrue to sellers without extensive eBay histories. Consistent with charity serving as a quality signal, we find fewer customer complaints among charity-intensive sellers.

Consumers consistently express a willingness to favor socially responsible firms, but will they actually pay more for products linked to charitable donations, green production, and similar activities? To answer this question, we analyze a novel data set that matches identical products sold on eBay via charity and non-charity auctions. Items sold through charity auctions have prices that are 6% higher, on average, than those in non-charity auctions. Bidders appear to value charity auction revenue as a public good, as they submit bids relatively early within charity auctions, which stimulates other bidders to bid more aggressively.

SUMMARYFor the 10% to 15% of American married couples who experience reproductive problems, in vitro fertilization (IVF) is the leading technologically advanced treatment procedure. However, IVF's expense may prevent many couples from receiving treatment, and those who are treated may take an overly aggressive approach to reduce the probability of failure. Aggressive treatment, which occurs through an increase in the number of embryos transferred during IVF, can lead to medically dangerous multiple births. We evaluated the principle policy proposal-insurance mandates-for improving IVF access and outcomes. We used data from US markets during 1995-2003 to show that broad insurance mandates for IVF result in not only large increases in treatment access but also significantly less aggressive treatment. More limited insurance mandates, which may apply to a subset of insurers or provide weaker guidelines for insurer behavior, generally have little effect on IVF markets.

Firms that use nonlinear pricing may distort product characteristics away from their efficient levels. This paper offers the first empirical study of this issue. Using data from a specialty coffee market, I estimate a structural utility model to compute consumers' benefits from changing products' sizes. I then compare the estimated benefits to cost data. Design distortions are relatively large for products not targeted to the highest-demand consumers. Distortions decrease toward zero with drink size for products with the largest profit margins. These results support some of the central predictions from nonlinear pricing theory, including "no distortion at the top."