nep-mkt New Economics Papers
on Marketing
Issue of 2012‒10‒06
three papers chosen by
Joao Carlos Correia Leitao
University of Beira Interior and Technical University of Lisbon

  1. Willingness-to-Pay for Organic Food Products and Organic Purity: Experimental Evidence By Strzok, Jesse L.; Huffman, Wallace E.
  2. Price Negotiation in Differentiated Products Markets: Evidence from the Canadian Mortgage Market By Jason Allen; Robert Clark; Jean-François Houde
  3. Beyond Corporate Social Responsibility: Foundations and global retailers By Marta Rey García

  1. By: Strzok, Jesse L.; Huffman, Wallace E.
    Date: 2012–09–24
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:isu:genres:35502&r=mkt
  2. By: Jason Allen; Robert Clark; Jean-François Houde
    Abstract: This paper measures market power in a decentralized market where contracts are determined through a search and negotiation process. The mortgage industry has many institutional features which suggest competitiveness: homogeneous contracts, negotiable rates, and, for a given consumer, common lending costs across lenders. As a result, even with a small number of lenders, informed borrowers can gather multiple quotes. However, there is important heterogeneity in the ability of consumers to understand the subtleties of financial contracts, in their ability or willingness to search and negotiate for quotes, and also in their degree of loyalty to their main financial institution. We propose and estimate a model to disentangle the different channels through which market power can arise for a given transaction in this environment. There are two main sources of market power. The first is search frictions. We find that over the five year period of the contract the average search cost corresponds to an upfront sunk cost of between $1,047 and $1,590. The second main source of market power is switching costs. We estimate that consumers are willing to pay between $759 and $1,617 upfront to avoid having to switch banks.
    Keywords: Financial institutions; Financial services; Market structure and pricing
    JEL: G21 L22 D4
    Date: 2012
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bca:bocawp:12-30&r=mkt
  3. By: Marta Rey García
    Abstract: This paper focuses on institutional philanthropy by retail firms, utilizing foundations connected to the top 50 global retailers as a case study. The purpose of this research is threefold: 1) To explore the philanthropic propensity of global retailers; 2) To define a typology of foundations connected to them; and 3) To explore the role played by those foundations in the context of the CSR strategies of their connected firms. Results confirm, on the one hand, the high philanthropic propensity of top global retailers and, on the other hand, that potential benefits of connected instrumental foundations go beyond those attributed to conventional CSR and traditional corporate giving by previous literature.
    Keywords: Filantropía corporativa; Responsabilidad social corporativa (RSC); Fundaciones; Empresas de distribución; Empresas familiares.
    JEL: M14 L81 M30 L22
    Date: 2012–09
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ovr:docfra:1206&r=mkt

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