United States Consumers Research Articles

Income and Expenditure for Relatively More versus Relatively Less Nutritious Food over the Life Cycle

United States consumers have been accused of being nutritionally inefficient, having a poor quality diet, and often placing themselves at nutritional risk because of their poor choice of foods (U.S. Congress). Unfortunately, the controversy over the consumption of nutritious versus less nutritious or junk foods has generated heated discussion but relatively little economic research. Numerous studies have been made of the income elasticities of food consumption (Burk 1962, Hymans and Shapiro), and Engel curves derived from econometric analysis of family budgets, primarily relating expenditures on food or another consumption good or commodity group to income levels of households, ceteris paribus, abound in the literature (Burk 1968, pp. 84, 215; Aitchison and Brown; Allen; Allen and Bowley; Champernowne; Cramer; Goreux; Hassan and Johnson 1977; Houthakker 1952, 1957; Prais and Houthakker; Phlips; and Tornquist). Adrian and Daniel in their 1976 article investigated the consumption of selected food nutrients in the United States using income and the life cycle stage as variables in their analysis, but they did not identify the foods which were the sources of the nutrients. Few researchers have examined the implications of and the differences in food expenditure patterns of households at various points in their lifetimes. And, more important, no research has been done on the expenditures on and income elasticities of the specific groups of food classified as relatively more nutritious and less nutritious components of diets. The specific purposes of this analysis were to ascertain, using a general functional form, whether or not expenditures on foods classified as relatively more nutritious and less nutritious components of diets vary over the life cycle for U.S. households with different income levels, and to compare income elasticities for the various life cycle stages for all foods, relatively more and relatively less nutritious components of diets.

Working Wives in the United States and Venezuela: A Cross-National Study of Decision Making

Changing female roles have affected family relationships, working opportunities, and the behavior of consumers. The working wife is taking a more active decisionmaking role in family purchases.; Cultural factors have also played a very important role in consumer behavior. Do changing female roles affect equally family decisions in all countries? A comparison of United States and Venezuelan consumers shows that working w ives affect the family structure in the two countries in diverse ways . However, both samples show an increased participation in family purchase decisions by working wives.

Welfare Implications of Grain Price Stabilization: Some Empirical Evidence for the United States

AbstractThis empirical study demonstrates that, although United States producers and consumers taken together benefit from policies which would stabilize feed grain prices, this is likely not the case for wheat. The model specifies a U.S. domestic demand relationship for food and feed use, a stock relationship and a foreign demand sector; these are estimated by ordinary and two‐stage least squares methods. The key to the analysis is in testing a well‐known theoretical model in which the desirability of price stabilization largely depends on the source of instability (i.e., whether instability is generated abroad or is created internally).

Free Competition and the Optimal Amount of Fraud

THIS paper explores the reasons for and determinants of the provision by a firm of false information to a consumer so as to induce purchases which would not be made if the consumer possessed full information about the qualities of his purchase. Market responses to potential for fraud are analyzed in detail. It is shown that fraud and related practices follow from significant costs both in the determination of quality of a particular good or service and in the effective vertical integration of seller and buyer through some exchange of property rights. Much of our discussion focuses on the key problem of the joint provision of diagnosis and services-such as the choice and execution of an automobile repair or taxicab route--but the model developed will be seen to have general applicability whenever the seller provides information which influences purchases, as through advertising or salesmen's promises. In the context of the repair problem, we explore the reasons for and the determinants of the provision of repair services in amounts greater than would be economically efficient, given the price of the services and their marginal product in terms of the service flow from the repaired commodity.' The possibility of this situation is suggested by the observation that in a considerable number of cases involving medical, automotive, and other repair services, contrary to the basic assumption of conventional demand theory, the consumer is unaware of the ability of the repair service to satisfy a given want.2

The Regional Impact of Lamb Imports on Equilibrium Returns to Domestic Producers, 1967

AbstractThere is little agreement on producer costs and consumer benefits resulting from meat imports. This paper utilizes a spatial equilibrium model to analyze the regional impact of three levels of lamb imports on United States lamb producers and consumers. Results demonstrate regional as well as quarterly variation. Most of the variation is explained by quarterly marketing patterns, shifts in demand, changes in optimum distribution patterns, changes in levels of imports and ports of entry, and restricted ports of entry for imports.