Identifying the factors that influence electricity demand in the continental United States and mathematically characterizing them are important for developing electricity consumption projections. The price elasticity of demand is especially important, since the electricity price effects of policy implementation can be substantial and the demand response to policy-induced changes in prices can s...

Economic literature in developed countries suggests that demand for alcoholic beverages is sensitive to price, with an estimated price elasticity ranging from -0.38 for beer and -0.7 for liquor. However, few studies have been conducted in developing countries. We employ a large individual-level dataset in China to estimate the effects of price on alcohol demand. Using the data from China Health...

We estimate a random utility model of demand to measure consumer response to package downsizing in consumer goods markets. To our knowledge this paper provides the first estimates of consumer response to package size. We perform the analysis using Nielsen Homescan data on bulk ice cream purchases of a panel of households in Chicago, between 1998 and 2007. The estimation framework involves model...

OBJECTIVES Bride price is a widespread custom in many parts of the world, including in most countries in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia. We hypothesised that problems relating to the obligatory ongoing remittances made by the husband and his family to the bride's family may be a source of mental disturbance (in the form of explosive anger and severe mental distress) among women. In additi...

This paper uses crowd-sourced transaction data from a cross-section of the US to examine demand for marijuana. State and regional variations in consumption, price and quality are explored. Price elasticity of demand estimates range between -0.3 and -0.6. Noticeable price differences are found between high, medium, and low quality marijuana, with high quality marijuana, at $13.57 per gram, 144% ...

* Disclaimer: The views presented in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of DFID i Acknowledgements The authors are very grateful to Issa Sanogo and Joyce Luma of WFP for all their help at various stages with this paper. Also thanks to David Dawe from FAO, as well as to everyone who attended the January 2010 workshop at ODI on country responses to the ...