IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecl/harjfk/rwp18-010.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Gains from Digitization: Evidence from Gift-Giving in Music

Author

Listed:
  • Dogan, Pinar

    (Harvard University)

  • Bourreau, Marc

    (Telecom Paris Tech)

Abstract

In this paper, we focus on recorded music gifts during the holiday season and estimate the reduction in deadweight loss due to the transition from physical CD gift-giving to digital music gift-giving with gift cards. Based on our survey data, we find that music CD gifts generate an average deadweight loss between 15 and 38 percent of the price. According to our estimates of gift music album sales which are based on U.S. data, the welfare gains from digitization, in terms of eliminated deadweight loss as a percentage of total spending on music albums, were between 5 to 13 percent during the week when digital sales peak in 2014.

Suggested Citation

  • Dogan, Pinar & Bourreau, Marc, 2018. "Gains from Digitization: Evidence from Gift-Giving in Music," Working Paper Series rwp18-010, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecl:harjfk:rwp18-010
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://research.hks.harvard.edu/publications/getFile.aspx?Id=1648
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Joel Waldfogel, 2005. "Does Consumer Irrationality Trump Consumer Sovereignty?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 87(4), pages 691-696, November.
    2. Waldfogel, Joel, 1993. "The Deadweight Loss of Christmas," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(5), pages 1328-1336, December.
    3. Prendergast, Canice & Stole, Lars, 2001. "The non-monetary nature of gifts," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 45(10), pages 1793-1810, December.
    4. Waldfogel, Joel, 1998. "The Deadweight Loss of Christmas: Reply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(5), pages 1358-1359, December.
    5. Solnick, Sara J & Hemenway, David, 1996. "The Deadweight Loss of Christmas: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(5), pages 1299-1305, December.
    6. John List & Jason Shogren, 1998. "The Deadweight Loss from Christmas: Comment," Artefactual Field Experiments 00531, The Field Experiments Website.
    7. Luis Aguiar & Joel Waldfogel, 2014. "Digitization, Copyright, and the Welfare Effects of Music Trade," JRC Working Papers on Digital Economy 2014-05, Joint Research Centre.
    8. Peitz, Martin & Waelbroeck, Patrick, 2006. "Why the music industry may gain from free downloading -- The role of sampling," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 24(5), pages 907-913, September.
    9. Orit Tykocinski & Bradley J. Ruffle, 2000. "The Deadweight Loss of Christmas: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(1), pages 319-324, March.
    10. List, John A & Shogren, Jason F, 1998. "The Deadweight Loss of Christmas: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(5), pages 1350-1355, December.
    11. Kaplan, Todd R. & Ruffle, Bradley J., 2009. "In search of welfare-improving gifts," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(4), pages 445-460, May.
    12. Peitz, Martin & Waldfogel, Joel, 2012. "The Oxford Handbook of the Digital Economy," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195397840.
    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. Martina Pocchiari & Jason M.T. Roos, 2023. "The Heterogeneous Effect of Digitizing Community Activities on Community Participation," CESifo Working Paper Series 10841, CESifo.

    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. Laura Birg & Anna Goeddeke, 2016. "Christmas Economics—A Sleigh Ride," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 54(4), pages 1980-1984, October.
    2. Principe, Kristine E. & Eisenhauer, Joseph G., 2009. "Gift-giving and deadweight loss," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 215-220, March.
    3. Zeev Shtudiner, 2020. "Holiday gift-giving - deadweight loss or welfare gain?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 40(3), pages 1977-1984.
    4. Parag Waknis & Ajit Gaikwad, 2017. "The Deadweight Loss of Diwali: A Developing Country Perspective on Economics of Gift Giving," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 37(1), pages 530-538.
    5. Kaplan, Todd R. & Ruffle, Bradley J., 2009. "In search of welfare-improving gifts," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(4), pages 445-460, May.
    6. Vic Benuyenah, 2021. "Face-saving and Seasonal Gifts: Analysis of Cultural Exchanges in the Confucian Market Place," International Review of Management and Marketing, Econjournals, vol. 11(2), pages 59-66.
    7. Daum-Avital, Liora & Azar, Ofer H., 2023. "Courtesy versus efficiency: Personal gifts and monetary gifts – Preferences and norms in Israeli society," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    8. Birg, Laura & Pommeranz, Simon, 2018. "The deadweight loss of christmas - Reply," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 361, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    9. Felső, Flóra Á & Soetevent, Adriaan R., 2014. "Broad and narrow bracketing in gift certificate spending," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 284-302.
    10. Reinstein, David, 2014. "The Economics of the Gift," Economics Discussion Papers 10009, University of Essex, Department of Economics.
    11. Lucy F. Ackert & Bryan K. Church & Gerald P. Dwyer, 2005. "When the shoe is on the other foot: experimental evidence on evaluation disparities," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2005-17, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    12. Huang, Wei & Rhee, S. Ghon & Suzuki, Katsushi & Yasutake, Taeko, 2022. "Do investors value shareholder perks? Evidence from Japan," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    13. Oz Shy, 2011. "A Short Survey of Network Economics," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 38(2), pages 119-149, March.
    14. Orit Tykocinski & Bradley J. Ruffle, 2000. "The Deadweight Loss of Christmas: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(1), pages 319-324, March.
    15. Michel André Maréchal & Christian Thöni, 2019. "Hidden Persuaders: Do Small Gifts Lubricate Business Negotiations?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(8), pages 3877-3888, August.
    16. repec:esx:essedp:749 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Flora Felso & Adriaan R. Soetevent, 2012. "How Consumers use Gift Certificates," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 12-002/1, Tinbergen Institute, revised 27 Nov 2013.
    18. Ellingsen, Tore & Johannesson, Magnus, 2009. "Time is not money," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 72(1), pages 96-102, October.
    19. Christiane Bradler & Susanne Neckermann, 2019. "The Magic of the Personal Touch: Field Experimental Evidence on Money and Appreciation as Gifts," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 121(3), pages 1189-1221, July.
    20. John List & Jason Shogren, 1998. "The Deadweight Loss from Christmas: Comment," Artefactual Field Experiments 00531, The Field Experiments Website.
    21. Basker, Emek, 2005. "'Twas four weeks before Christmas: Retail sales and the length of the Christmas shopping season," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 89(3), pages 317-322, December.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D10 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - General
    • L82 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Entertainment; Media
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ecl:harjfk:rwp18-010. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ksharus.html .

    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.