IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ebl/ecbull/eb-06d00021.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Testing the Alchian-Allen Theorem: A Study of Consumer Behavior in the Gasoline Market

Author

Listed:
  • Robert Lawson

    (Capital University)

  • Lauren Raymer

    (University of North Carolina)

Abstract

This paper uses a data set of daily sales at a single gasoline station over a seven year period to determine if consumers respond to relative price changes among the three grades of gasoline. Based on the reasoning of Alchian and Allen (1964) and Barzel (1976), market shares of higher quality gasoline should increase at the expense of regular grade gasoline when overall gasoline prices increase. The empirical results do not conform to this expectation. We find instead that the consumers in this sample responded to higher gasoline prices by switching to mid grade gasoline from premium grade gasoline leaving the market share of regular gasoline unchanged.

Suggested Citation

  • Robert Lawson & Lauren Raymer, 2006. "Testing the Alchian-Allen Theorem: A Study of Consumer Behavior in the Gasoline Market," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 4(35), pages 1-6.
    • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-06d00021
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.accessecon.com/pubs/EB/2006/Volume4/EB-06D00021A.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sobel, Russell S & Garrett, Thomas A, 1997. "Taxation and Product Quality: New Evidence from Generic Cigarettes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(4), pages 880-887, August.
    2. Sumner, Michael T & Ward, Robert, 1981. "Tax Changes and Cigarette Prices [An Alternative Approach to the Analysis of Taxation]," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(6), pages 1261-1265, December.
    3. Barzel, Yoram, 1976. "An Alternative Approach to the Analysis of Taxation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 84(6), pages 1177-1197, December.
    4. Bertonazzi, Eric P & Maloney, Michael T & McCormick, Robert E, 1993. "Some Evidence on the Alchian and Allen Theorem: The Third Law of Demand?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 31(3), pages 383-393, July.
    5. Johnson, Terry R, 1978. "Additional Evidence on the Effects of Alternative Taxes on Cigarette Prices," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 86(2), pages 325-328, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Minagawa, Junichi, 2012. "On Giffen-like goods," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 115(2), pages 282-285.
    2. Charlotte Emlinger & Viola Lamani, 2020. "International trade, quality sorting and trade costs: the case of Cognac," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 156(3), pages 579-609, August.
    3. Solimine, Philip & Isaac, R. Mark, 2023. "Reputation and market structure in experimental platforms," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 205(C), pages 528-559.
    4. Mamipour, Siab & Salem, Ali Asghar & Sayadi, Mohammad & Azizkhani, Masoumeh, 2023. "Retail gasoline pricing in a subsidized energy market: An empirical analysis from AIDS model for Iran," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 183(C).
    5. Junichi Minagawa & Thorsten Upmann, 2012. "The Generalized Alchian-Allen Theorem," CESifo Working Paper Series 3969, CESifo.
    6. Markus Dertwinkel-Kalt & Katrin Köhler & Mirjam R. J. Lange & Tobias Wenzel, 2017. "Demand Shifts Due to Salience Effects: Experimental Evidence," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 15(3), pages 626-653.
    7. Justine Hastings & Jesse M. Shapiro, 2012. "Mental Accounting and Consumer Choice: Evidence from Commodity Price Shocks," NBER Working Papers 18248, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Philip DeCicca & Donald Kenkel & Feng Liu, 2015. "Reservation Prices: An Economic Analysis of Cigarette Purchases on Indian Reservations," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 68(1), pages 93-118, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:wvu:wpaper:05-11 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:4:y:2006:i:35:p:1-6 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. T Nesbit, 2007. "Excise Taxation and Product Quality: The Gasoline Market," Economic Issues Journal Articles, Economic Issues, vol. 12(2), pages 1-14, September.
    4. Lesley Chiou & Erich Muehlegger, 2014. "Consumer Response to Cigarette Excise Tax Changes," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 67(3), pages 621-650, September.
    5. Delipalla, Sophia & O'Donnell, Owen, 2001. "Estimating tax incidence, market power and market conduct: The European cigarette industry," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 19(6), pages 885-908, May.
    6. Goolsbee, Austan, 2004. "Taxes and the quality of capital," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(3-4), pages 519-543, March.
    7. Ljunge Martin, 2011. "Do Taxes Produce Better Wine?," Journal of Agricultural & Food Industrial Organization, De Gruyter, vol. 9(1), pages 1-16, December.
    8. Liu, Liqun, 2011. "The Alchian-Allen theorem and the law of relative demand: The case of multiple quality-differentiable brands," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 52-57, January.
    9. Hyunchul Kim & Dongwon Lee, 2021. "Racial demographics and cigarette tax shifting: evidence from scanner data," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 61(2), pages 1011-1037, August.
    10. Blum, Bianca, 2018. "Ausgestaltung einer Steuerpolitik zur Förderung von LED-Beleuchtung," The Constitutional Economics Network Working Papers 01-2018, University of Freiburg, Department of Economic Policy and Constitutional Economic Theory.
    11. Robert Lawson & Todd Nesbit, 2013. "Alchian and Allen Revisited: Law Enforcement and the Price of Weed," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 41(4), pages 363-370, December.
    12. Jeremy Bulow & Paul Klemperer, 1998. "The Tobacco Deal," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 29(1998 Micr), pages 323-394.
    13. Charlotte Emlinger & Viola Lamani, 2020. "International trade, quality sorting and trade costs: the case of Cognac," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 156(3), pages 579-609, August.
    14. Michael Keen, 1998. "The balance between specific and ad valorem taxation," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 19(1), pages 1-37, February.
    15. Philip DeCicca & Donald Kenkel & Feng Liu, 2015. "Reservation Prices: An Economic Analysis of Cigarette Purchases on Indian Reservations," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 68(1), pages 93-118, March.
    16. Stuart Fowler & William Ford, 2004. "Has a quarter-trillion-dollar settlement helped the tobacco industry?," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 28(3), pages 430-444, September.
    17. Blum, Bianca, 2020. "Fleischbesteuerung in Deutschland - Mengen- oder Mehrwertsteuer? Diskussion und Politische Implikationen," The Constitutional Economics Network Working Papers 01-2020, University of Freiburg, Department of Economic Policy and Constitutional Economic Theory.
    18. Paul Calcott & Vladimir Petkov, 2016. "Corrective Taxes and Cigarette Characteristics," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(7), pages 844-859, July.
    19. Leigh Ann Leung, 2014. "Healthy And Unhealthy Assimilation: Country Of Origin And Smoking Behavior Among Immigrants," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 23(12), pages 1411-1429, December.
    20. Minagawa, Junichi, 2012. "On Giffen-like goods," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 115(2), pages 282-285.
    21. Markus Dertwinkel-Kalt & Katrin Köhler & Mirjam R. J. Lange & Tobias Wenzel, 2017. "Demand Shifts Due to Salience Effects: Experimental Evidence," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 15(3), pages 626-653.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Alchian-Allen Theorem;

    JEL classification:

    • D0 - Microeconomics - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-06d00021. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: John P. Conley (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.