nep-dcm New Economics Papers
on Discrete Choice Models
Issue of 2021‒09‒13
fifteen papers chosen by
Edoardo Marcucci
Università degli studi Roma Tre

  1. Accelerating the Adoption of Disruptive Technologies: The Impact of COVID-19 on Intention to Use Self-Driving Vehicles By Maher Said; Emma R. Zajdela; Amanda Stathopoulos
  2. Costs, Reliability, Vehicle Characteristics, and Incentives are the Top Factors Influencing Freight Vehicle Technology Choices By Jaller, Miguel
  3. Consumer Willingness to Pay for Secure Pork Supply Plan Certification By Lee, Jiwon; Schulz, Lee
  4. Analysis of taste heterogeneity in commuters travel decisions using joint parking and mode choice model: A case from urban India By Janak Parmar; Gulnazbanu Saiyed; Sanjaykumar Dave
  5. On the estimation of discrete choice models to capture irrational customer behaviors By Sanjay Dominik Jena; Andrea Lodi; Claudio Sole
  6. Does the quality conscious consumer really exist? How attitude-based segmentation is reflected in stated and revealed preferences for food products with special quality characteristics By Grunert, Klaus G G.; Hesselberg, Julie
  7. Bayesian Estimation of a Hybrid Generalized Multinomial Logit Model By Cheng, Haotian; Lambert, Dayton M.
  8. Evaluating the Efficiency-Participation Tradeoff in Agricultural Conservation Programs: The Effect of Reverse Auctions, Spatial Targeting, and Higher Offered Payments By Gregory Howard; Wendong Zhang; Adriana Valcu-Lisman; Philip W. Gassman
  9. What Do We Really Know about Consumer Preferences for Aquaculture Products? By Smetana, Kerri; Melstrom, Richard; Malone, Trey
  10. Regional and Distance Effects on Consumer Preferences for Local Milk By Lopez, Rigoberto A.; Khanal, Binod
  11. Regional and Distance Effects on Consumer Preferences for Local Milk By Lopez, Rigoberto A.; Khanal, Binod
  12. Is farmers' crop choice exogenous to past yield shocks? By Lee, Seunghyun
  13. Marginalism, Egalitarianism and Efficiency in Multi-Choice Games By David Lowing; Kevin Techer
  14. The price of indoor air pollution: evidence from risk maps and the housing market By Pinchbeck, Edward W.; Roth, Sefi; Szumilo, Nikodem; Vanino, Enrico
  15. Bayesian Analysis of Farmers’ Decision to Sell Nothing or Some Output Through Contract Farming By Ng’ombe, John N.; Kabwela, Benny; Kiwanuka-Lubinda, Rebecca N.

  1. By: Maher Said; Emma R. Zajdela; Amanda Stathopoulos
    Abstract: One of the most notable global transportation trends is the accelerated pace of development in vehicle automation technologies. Uncertainty surrounds the future of automated mobility as there is no clear consensus on potential adoption patterns, ownership versus shared use status and travel impacts. Adding to this uncertainty is the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic that has triggered profound changes in mobility behaviors as well as accelerated the adoption of new technologies at an unprecedented rate. This study examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on willingness to adopt the emerging new technology of self-driving vehicles. Using data from a survey disseminated in June 2020 to 700 respondents in contiguous United States, we perform a difference-in-difference regression to analyze the shift in willingness to use autonomous vehicles as part of a shared fleet before and during the pandemic. The results reveal that the COVID-19 pandemic has a positive and highly significant impact on consideration of autonomous vehicles. This shift is present regardless of techsavviness, gender or political views. Individuals who are younger, left-leaning and frequent users of shared modes of travel are expected to become more likely to use autonomous vehicles once offered. Understanding the effects of these attributes on the increase in consideration of AVs is important for policy making, as these effects provide a guide to predicting adoption of autonomous vehicles - once available - and to identify segments of the population likely to be more resistant to adopting AVs.
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2108.01615&r=
  2. By: Jaller, Miguel
    Abstract: California has set goals for transitioning the freight sector to near-zero-emission and zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs). California offers several incentive programs to encourage adoption of ZEVs, but purchase decisions are driven by complex factors beyond simple purchase price. Understanding the behaviors and attitudes of freight stakeholders toward ZEVs can inform the design of more effective incentive programs to meet California’s goals. Researchers at the University of California, Davis deployed a stated-preference survey of fleet and carrier companies to collect information about vehicle purchase preferences and how they might be influenced by various incentive programs. This policy brief summarizes the findings from that research and provides policy implications. View the NCST Project Webpage
    Keywords: Social and Behavioral Sciences, Behavior, Forecasting, Freight transportation, Incentives, Market penetration, Surveys, Travel demand, Trucks, Zero emission vehicles
    Date: 2021–09–01
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdl:itsdav:qt0p14c77j&r=
  3. By: Lee, Jiwon; Schulz, Lee
    Keywords: Marketing, Agribusiness, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea21:312669&r=
  4. By: Janak Parmar; Gulnazbanu Saiyed; Sanjaykumar Dave
    Abstract: The concept of transportation demand management (TDM) upholds the development of sustainable mobility through the triumph of optimally balanced transport modal share in cities. The modal split management directly reflects on TDM of each transport subsystem, including parking. In developing countries, the policy-makers have largely focused on supply-side measures, yet demand-side measures have remained unaddressed in policy implications. Ample literature is available presenting responses of TDM strategies, but most studies account mode choice and parking choice behaviour separately rather than considering trade-offs between them. Failing to do so may lead to biased model estimates and impropriety in policy implications. This paper seeks to fill this gap by admitting parking choice as an endogenous decision within the model of mode choice behaviour. This study integrates attitudinal factors and built-environment variables in addition to parking and travel attributes for developing comprehensive estimation results. A mixed logit model with random coefficients is estimated using hierarchical Bayes approach based on the Markov Chain Monte Carlo simulation method. The results reveal significant influence of mode/parking specific attitudes on commuters choice behaviour in addition to the built-environment factors and mode/parking related attributes. It is identified that considerable shift is occurring between parking-types in preference to switching travel mode with hypothetical changes in parking attributes. Besides, study investigates the heterogeneity in the willingness-to-pay through a follow-up regression model, which provides important insights for identifying possible sources of this heterogeneity among respondents. The study provides remarkable results which may be beneficial to planning authorities for improving TDM strategies especially in developing countries.
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2109.01045&r=
  5. By: Sanjay Dominik Jena; Andrea Lodi; Claudio Sole
    Abstract: The Random Utility Maximization model is by far the most adopted framework to estimate consumer choice behavior. However, behavioral economics has provided strong empirical evidence of irrational choice behavior, such as halo effects, that are incompatible with this framework. Models belonging to the Random Utility Maximization family may therefore not accurately capture such irrational behavior. Hence, more general choice models, overcoming such limitations, have been proposed. However, the flexibility of such models comes at the price of increased risk of overfitting. As such, estimating such models remains a challenge. In this work, we propose an estimation method for the recently proposed Generalized Stochastic Preference choice model, which subsumes the family of Random Utility Maximization models and is capable of capturing halo effects. Specifically, we show how to use partially-ranked preferences to efficiently model rational and irrational customer types from transaction data. Our estimation procedure is based on column generation, where relevant customer types are efficiently extracted by expanding a tree-like data structure containing the customer behaviors. Further, we propose a new dominance rule among customer types whose effect is to prioritize low orders of interactions among products. An extensive set of experiments assesses the predictive accuracy of the proposed approach. Our results show that accounting for irrational preferences can boost predictive accuracy by 12.5% on average, when tested on a real-world dataset from a large chain of grocery and drug stores.
    Date: 2021–09
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2109.03882&r=
  6. By: Grunert, Klaus G G.; Hesselberg, Julie
    Keywords: Marketing, Research Methods/Statistical Methods, Agribusiness
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea21:313345&r=
  7. By: Cheng, Haotian; Lambert, Dayton M.
    Keywords: Research Methods/Statistical Methods, Marketing, Agribusiness
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea21:312775&r=
  8. By: Gregory Howard; Wendong Zhang (Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD)); Adriana Valcu-Lisman; Philip W. Gassman (Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD))
    Abstract: Using a survey of 430 farmer respondents in the Boone and North Raccoon River watersheds in Iowa, we examine the impacts of three program innovations-reverse auctions, spatially targeted payments, and higher offered payments-on agricultural water conservation program efficiency and participation by farmers. We combine farmer responses to a discrete choice experiment offering voluntary conservation contracts with township-level estimates of per-acre nitrogen reductions from each practice derived from the process-based ecohydrological Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model. Using a random-parameters logit model, we show that both cost-reducing and benefit-boosting interventions reduce costs per projected pound of nitrogen removed from the watershed for each practice and thus are more cost-effective than the prevailing current cost-share programs. However, we find that these interventions can reduce participation by 20%-60%. Furthermore, we find cover crop contracts are far more cost-effective than no-till/strip-till and split N application contracts.
    Date: 2021–09
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ias:cpaper:21-wp622&r=
  9. By: Smetana, Kerri; Melstrom, Richard; Malone, Trey
    Keywords: Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Agribusiness, Marketing
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea21:313337&r=
  10. By: Lopez, Rigoberto A.; Khanal, Binod
    Keywords: Marketing, Agribusiness, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea21:313346&r=
  11. By: Lopez, Rigoberto A.; Khanal, Binod
    Keywords: Marketing, Agribusiness, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea21:312700&r=
  12. By: Lee, Seunghyun
    Keywords: Production Economics, Environmental Economics and Policy, Resource/Energy Economics and Policy
    Date: 2021–08
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea21:312861&r=
  13. By: David Lowing (Univ Lyon, UJM Saint-Etienne, GATE UMR 5824, F-42023 Saint- Etienne, France; Gaz Réseau Distribution France, Direction Economie et Régulation.); Kevin Techer (Univ Lyon, UJM Saint-Etienne, GATE UMR 5824, F-42023 Saint- Etienne, France)
    Abstract: The search for a compromise between marginalism and egalitarianism has given rise to many discussions. In the context of cooperative games, this compromise can be understood as a trade-off between the Shapley value and the Equal division value. We investigate this compromise in the context of multi-choice games in which players have several activity levels. To do so, we propose new extensions of the Shapley value and of the Weighted Division values to multi-choice games. Contrary to the existing solution concepts for multi-choice games, each one of these values satisfies a core condition introduced by Grabisch and Xie (2007), namely Multi-Efficiency. We compromise between marginalism and egalitarianism by introducing the multi-choice Egalitarian Shapley values, computed as the convex combination of our extensions. To conduct this study, we introduce new axioms for multi-choice games. This allows us to provide an axiomatic foundation for each of these values.
    Keywords: Multi-choice games, Multi-choice Shapley value, Multi-choice Equal division value, Multi-choice Egalitarian Shapley values
    JEL: C71
    Date: 2021
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gat:wpaper:2115&r=
  14. By: Pinchbeck, Edward W.; Roth, Sefi; Szumilo, Nikodem; Vanino, Enrico
    Abstract: This paper uses the housing market to examine the costs of indoor air pollution. We focus on radon, a common indoor air pollutant which is the leading cause of lung cancer after smoking. For identification, we exploit a natural experiment whereby a risk map update in England induces exogenous variation in published pollution risk levels. We find a significant negative relationship between changes in published pollution risk levels and residential property prices. Interestingly, we do not find a symmetric effect for decreasing risk. We also show that the update of the risk map led higher socio-economic groups (SEGs) to move away from affected areas, attracting lower SEG residents via lower prices. Finally, we develop a new theoretical framework to account for preference based sorting, which allows us to calculate that the average willingness to pay to avoid the risk of indoor air pollution is 1.6% of a property price.
    Keywords: indoor air pollution; neighbourhood sorting; house prices; risk information; radon
    JEL: R21 Q53 H23
    Date: 2021–09–03
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:111853&r=
  15. By: Ng’ombe, John N.; Kabwela, Benny; Kiwanuka-Lubinda, Rebecca N.
    Abstract: Contract farming (CF) is a pre-output agreement between agricultural producers and buyers. CF helps to integrate farmers in developing countries to global agricultural value chains (Barrett et al. 2012). But research also shows that value chain intermediary agents acquire superior earnings than farmers. This study employs a Bayesian zero-one-inflated beta regression model to analyzes determinants of farmer’s decision to sell zero or some output in CF.
    Keywords: Agribusiness, Farm Management
    Date: 2021
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea21:313416&r=

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