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Futile Attempts at Self-Control

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Author Info
Paul Heidhues
Botond Kőszegi

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Abstract

We investigate costly yet futile attempts at self-control when consumption of a harmful product has a binary breakdown/no-breakdown nature and individuals tend to underestimate their need for self-control. Considering time-inconsistent preferences as well as temptation disutility, we show that becoming more sophisticated can decrease welfare and investigate what kind of mistaken beliefs lead to low welfare. With time-inconsistent preferences, being close to perfectly understanding one's preferences but assigning zero probability to true preferences induces the worst outcome. (JEL: D03, D11, D91) (c) 2009 by the European Economic Association.

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File URL: http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1162/JEEA.2009.7.2-3.423
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Publisher Info
Article provided by MIT Press in its journal Journal of the European Economic Association.

Volume (Year): 7 (2009)
Issue (Month): 2-3 (04-05)
Pages: 423-434
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Handle: RePEc:tpr:jeurec:v:7:y:2009:i:2-3:p:423-434

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Economics; Underlying Principles
D11 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Theory
D91 - Microeconomics - - Intertemporal Choice and Growth - - - Intertemporal Consumer Choice; Life Cycle Models and Saving

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This page was last updated on 2009-11-16.

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