Attribute substitution in household vehicle portfolios

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Archsmith, James; Gillingham, Kenneth T.; Knittel, Christopher R.; Rapson, David S.
• 署名单位: University System of Maryland; University of Maryland College Park; Yale University; Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); University of California System; University of California Davis
• 刊物名称: RAND JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0741-6261
• DOI: 10.1111/1756-2171.12353
• 发表日期: 2020
• 页码: 1162-1196
• 关键词: fuel-economy; gasoline; EFFICIENCY; GOODS; demand; prices; TRADE; MODEL

摘要

Roughly three quarters of vehicles are purchased into multi-car households. We study whether households are willing to substitute attributes, such as fuel economy, across vehicles within their portfolio. We develop a novel strategy to separately identify idiosyncratic preferences for an attribute from these within-portfolio effects. Using the universe of household vehicle registration records in California over a 6-year period, we find that two-car households exhibit strong substitution across vehicles when faced with an exogenous change to fuel intensity of a kept vehicle. This effect can erode a substantial portion of the benefit from major policies, such as Cash-for-Clunkers.