IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedgfe/2006-02.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Paper or plastic? the effect of time on the use of check and debit cards at grocery stores

Author

Listed:
  • Elizabeth C. Klee

Abstract

Time is a significant cost of conducting transactions, and theoretical models predict that transactions costs significantly affect the type of media of exchange buyers use. However, there is little empirical work documenting the magnitude of this effect. This paper uses grocery store scanner data to examine how time affects consumer choices of checks and debit cards. On average, check transactions take thirty percent longer than debit card transactions. This time difference is a significant factor in the choice to use a debit card over a check and offers empirical evidence for transactions costs affecting the use of media of exchange.

Suggested Citation

  • Elizabeth C. Klee, 2006. "Paper or plastic? the effect of time on the use of check and debit cards at grocery stores," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2006-02, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2006-02
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/feds/2006/200602/200602abs.html
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: http://www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/feds/2006/200602/200602pap.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gerald S. Oettinger, 1999. "An Empirical Analysis of the Daily Labor Supply of Stadium Vendors," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(2), pages 360-392, April.
    2. Whitesell, William C, 1992. "Deposit Banks and the Market for Payment Media," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 24(4), pages 483-498, November.
    3. William J. Baumol, 1952. "The Transactions Demand for Cash: An Inventory Theoretic Approach," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 66(4), pages 545-556.
    4. ten Raa, Thijs & Shestalova, Victoria, 2004. "Empirical evidence on payment media costs and switch points," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 203-213, January.
    5. Hayashi Fumiko & Klee Elizabeth, 2003. "Technology Adoption and Consumer Payments: Evidence from Survey Data," Review of Network Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 2(2), pages 1-16, June.
    6. Geoffrey R. Gerdes & Jack K. Walton, 2002. "The use of checks and other noncash payment instruments in the United States," Federal Reserve Bulletin, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), vol. 88(Aug), pages 360-374, August.
    7. Lee, Lung-Fei, 1978. "Unionism and Wage Rates: A Simultaneous Equations Model with Qualitative and Limited Dependent Variables," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 19(2), pages 415-433, June.
    8. Dowd, Kevin, 1990. "The Value of Time and the Transactions Demand for Money," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 22(1), pages 51-64, February.
    9. Shy, Oz & Tarkka, Juha, 2002. "The Market for Electronic Cash Cards," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 34(2), pages 299-314, May.
    10. Murphy, Kevin M & Topel, Robert H, 2002. "Estimation and Inference in Two-Step Econometric Models," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 20(1), pages 88-97, January.
    11. Karni, Edi, 1973. "The Transactions Demand for Cash: Incorporation of the Value of Time into the Inventory Approach," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(5), pages 1216-1225, Sept.-Oct.
    12. Judith A. Chevalier & Anil K. Kashyap & Peter E. Rossi, 2003. "Why Don't Prices Rise During Periods of Peak Demand? Evidence from Scanner Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 15-37, March.
    13. Robert C. Feenstra & Matthew D. Shapiro, 2003. "Scanner Data and Price Indexes," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number feen03-1, March.
    14. Brueckner, Jan K & Follain, James R, 1988. "The Rise and Fall of the ARM: An Econometric Analysis of Mortgage Choice," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 70(1), pages 93-102, February.
    15. Austan Goolsbee & Amil Petrin, 2001. "The Consumer Gains from Direct Broadcast Satellites and the Competition with Cable Television," NBER Working Papers 8317, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    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. Zinman, Jonathan, 2009. "Debit or credit?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 358-366, February.
    2. David Bounie & Abel Francois, 2008. "Is Baumol's 'square root law' still relevant? evidence from micro-level data," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(13), pages 1091-1098.
    3. Hyytinen Ari & Takalo Tuomas, 2009. "Consumer Awareness and the Use of Payment Media: Evidence from Young Finnish Consumers," Review of Network Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 8(2), pages 1-25, June.
    4. Wilko Bolt & David Humphrey & Roland Uittenbogaard, 2008. "Transaction Pricing and the Adoption of Electronic Payments: A Cross-Country Comparison," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 4(1), pages 89-123, March.
    5. Tobias Truetsch, 2014. "The Impact of Contactless Payment on Spending," Proceedings of International Academic Conferences 0702228, International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences.
    6. Ching, Andrew T. & Hayashi, Fumiko, 2010. "Payment card rewards programs and consumer payment choice," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1773-1787, August.
    7. Elena Sinelnikova-Muryleva, 2011. "Innovations in the sphere of payments and the money demand in Russia," Research Paper Series, Gaidar Institute for Economic Policy, issue 157P.

    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. Zinman, Jonathan, 2009. "Debit or credit?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 358-366, February.
    2. Snellman, Heli, 2006. "Automated teller machine network market structure and cash usage," Scientific Monographs, Bank of Finland, number 2006_038.
    3. Carlos Arango & Yassine Bouhdaoui & David Bounie & Martina Eschelbach & Lola Hernández, 2013. "Cash Management and Payment Choices: A Simulation Model with International Comparisons," Staff Working Papers 13-53, Bank of Canada.
    4. Hayashi Fumiko & Klee Elizabeth, 2003. "Technology Adoption and Consumer Payments: Evidence from Survey Data," Review of Network Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 2(2), pages 1-16, June.
    5. repec:bof:bofrdp:urn:nbn:fi:bof-201511251450 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Gene Amromin & Sujit Chakravorti, 2007. "Debit card and cash usage: a cross-country analysis," Working Paper Series WP-07-04, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    7. Klee, Elizabeth, 2008. "How people pay: Evidence from grocery store data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(3), pages 526-541, April.
    8. Gene Amromin & Sujit Chakravorti, 2009. "Whither Loose Change? The Diminishing Demand for Small‐Denomination Currency," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(2‐3), pages 315-335, March.
    9. Ulf Kalckreuth & Tobias Schmidt & Helmut Stix, 2014. "Choosing and using payment instruments: evidence from German microdata," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 46(3), pages 1019-1055, May.
    10. Jonathan Zinman, 2004. "Why use debit instead of credit? Consumer choice in a trillion-dollar market," Staff Reports 191, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    11. Levy, Daniel & Müller, Georg & Chen, Haipeng (Allan) & Bergen, Mark & Dutta, Shantanu, 2010. "Holiday Price Rigidity and Cost of Price Adjustment," EconStor Open Access Articles, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, pages 172-198.
    12. C.K. Folkertsma & G.E. Hebbink, 1998. "Cash management and choice of payment media: a critical survey of the theory," WO Research Memoranda (discontinued) 532, Netherlands Central Bank, Research Department.
    13. Ulf Von Kalckreuth & Tobias Schmidt & Helmut Stix, 2014. "Using Cash to Monitor Liquidity: Implications for Payments, Currency Demand, and Withdrawal Behavior," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 46(8), pages 1753-1786, December.
    14. Schuh, Scott & Stavins, Joanna, 2010. "Why are (some) consumers (finally) writing fewer checks? The role of payment characteristics," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1745-1758, August.
    15. Irina A. Telyukova, 2013. "Household Need for Liquidity and the Credit Card Debt Puzzle," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 80(3), pages 1148-1177.
    16. David Bounie & Abel François, 2006. "Les déterminants de la détention et de l’usage des instruments de paiement : éléments théoriques et empiriques," Revue d'Économie Financière, Programme National Persée, vol. 83(2), pages 159-176.
    17. Columba, Francesco, 2009. "Narrow money and transaction technology: New disaggregated evidence," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 61(4), pages 312-325, July.
    18. Snellman, Heli & Virén, Matti, 2006. "ATM networks and cash usage," Research Discussion Papers 21/2006, Bank of Finland.
    19. Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes & Susan Pozo, 2004. "On the Use of Differing Money Transmission Methods by Mexican Immigrants," Economic Working Papers at Centro de Estudios Andaluces E2004/06, Centro de Estudios Andaluces.
    20. Timothy Richards, 2007. "A nested logit model of strategic promotion," Quantitative Marketing and Economics (QME), Springer, vol. 5(1), pages 63-91, March.
    21. Georg Muller & Mark Bergen & Shantanu Dutta & Daniel Levy, 2006. "Private label price rigidity during holiday periods," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(1), pages 57-62.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Consumer behavior; Checks;

    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:fip:fedgfe:2006-02. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbgvus.html .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.