|
on Cultural Economics |
|
Issue of 2025–01–06
three papers chosen by Roberto Zanola, Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale |
| By: | Nicolas Lagios; Pierre-Guillaume Méon |
| Abstract: | Exploiting the award process, we implement a regression discontinuity design to estimate the effect of winning France's main literary prize, the Goncourt. It increases sales, especially for books that sold fewer copies before the announcement, the number of reviews on Amazon, and the probability of them being negative. The effect is partly driven by an increase in word of mouth. Those findings are consistent with a model where the prize provides information on the existence of a book and acts as a quality signal and a coordination device but prompts consumers to read books that are far from their tastes. |
| Date: | 2024–03–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ulb:ulbeco:2013/372011 |
| By: | Benison Thomas (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research); Trinh Le (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research); Arthur Grimes (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research) |
| Abstract: | Using data from the 2016 and 2021 New Zealand General Social Surveys, this study investigates the impact of arts and cultural (AC) participation on personal wellbeing and quantifies in monetary terms the value of such participation to individuals. While it is not significantly associated with life satisfaction, we find that active AC participation (taking part) is associated with higher eudaimonic wellbeing (specifically, a greater sense of purpose), which may be a contributor to greater long-term wellbeing. We find that passive AC participation (observing or being audience) is associated with higher life satisfaction and higher short-term wellbeing, in the form of greater happiness and mental wellbeing. We show that an important pathway through which passive AC participation affects life satisfaction is via mental health, by increasing how often one feels calm and peaceful and reducing how often one feels downhearted and depressed. Using the Wellbeing Valuation approach, we estimate that on average people value passive AC participation at around 6-20% of their income, which is equivalent to $2, 800-$9, 300 per person per year at the median income level. |
| Keywords: | Arts and cultural participation; life satisfaction; Wellbeing Valuation approach |
| JEL: | Z11 I31 |
| Date: | 2024–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mtu:wpaper:24_04 |
| By: | Daniel Lüke (University of Giessen) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the sales distribution and genre composition of the German book market across different retail channels—e-commerce, chain stores, and independent bookstores—over the period 2011-2018. Utilizing a unique dataset comprising weekly sales data of approximately 50, 000 top-selling book titles, the study challenges the economic relevance of the “long tail†effect, which suggests that niche products hold significant market share due to digitalization. Our findings reveal that both online and offline sales are heavily concentrated on a few best-selling titles, with the “long tail†products accounting for a negligible proportion of overall sales. However, a “middle tail†of moderately popular books, more prominent in online sales and independent bookstores, suggests diverse consumption patterns not captured by conventional models focusing on the extremes of sales distributions. We further observe significant differences in the genre composition and attributes of books sold across channels, filling a gap in the existing literature. For example, chain stores exhibit higher concentrations of bestsellers, while independent bookstores show a more diverse array of less recent titles. These findings imply that consumer preferences vary significantly by retail channel, indicating limited substitutability between channels. |
| JEL: | L81 L82 Z11 |
| Date: | 2024 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mar:magkse:202419 |