IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jeborg/v126y2016ipbp130-136.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Cash on the table: Why traditional theories of market failure fail

Author

Listed:
  • Frank, Robert H.

Abstract

Many modern progressives attribute the market's failings to conspiracies by powerful corporate actors to exploit workers and consumers. In this paper I defend the claim that many of the same failures are instead often rooted in competition among individuals for relative advantage. In the familiar stadium metaphor, all stand to get a better view, only to discover that no one sees any better than if all had remained comfortably seated. Analogous discrepancies between individual and collective incentives help explain the presence of overtime laws, workplace safety regulations, and many other institutional features of the modern welfare state. These features would be useful even if all consumers were perfectly informed and rational and markets took the perfectly competitive ideal form described in textbooks.

Suggested Citation

  • Frank, Robert H., 2016. "Cash on the table: Why traditional theories of market failure fail," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 126(PB), pages 130-136.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:126:y:2016:i:pb:p:130-136
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2015.10.015
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268115002826
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jebo.2015.10.015?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Samuel Bowles & Yongjin Park, 2005. "Emulation, Inequality, and Work Hours: Was Thorsten Veblen Right?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(507), pages 397-412, November.
    2. Alan D. Viard & Robert Carroll, 2012. "Progressive Consumption Taxation: The X Tax Revisited," Books, American Enterprise Institute, number 10533, September.
    3. Frank, Robert H. & Levine, Adam Seth & Dijk, Oege, 2014. "Expenditure Cascades," Review of Behavioral Economics, now publishers, vol. 1(1-2), pages 55-73, January.
    4. repec:aei:rpbook:33699 is not listed on IDEAS
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Constantinos Alexiou & Adimulya Kartiyasa, 2020. "Does greater income inequality cause increased work hours? New evidence from high income economies," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 72(4), pages 380-392, October.
    2. Michalis Nikiforos, 2015. "A Nonbehavioral Theory of Saving," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_844, Levy Economics Institute.
    3. Bilancini, Ennio & Boncinelli, Leonardo, 2019. "Wage inequality, labor income taxes, and the notion of social status," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 13, pages 1-35.
    4. Leites, Martín & Rivero, Analía & Salas, Gonzalo, 2024. "The positionality of goods and the positional concern’s origin," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    5. Li, Linyang, 2018. "Financial inclusion and poverty: The role of relative income," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 165-191.
    6. Soon Ryoo & Yun K. Kim, 2014. "Income Distribution, Consumer Debt and Keeping up with the Joneses," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 65(4), pages 585-618, November.
    7. Stefani, Alessia De, 2020. "Debt, inequality and house prices: Explaining the dynamics of household borrowing prior to the great recession," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(C).
    8. Strehl, Wolfgang, 2019. "Revisiting the progressive consumption tax: A business cycle perspective," Discussion Papers 2019/13, Free University Berlin, School of Business & Economics.
    9. Sung-Ha HwangBy & Jungmin Lee, 2017. "Conspicuous consumption and income inequality," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 69(4), pages 870-896.
    10. Qiao, Kunyuan & Dowell, Glen, 2022. "Environmental concerns, income inequality, and purchase of environmentally-friendly products: A longitudinal study of U.S. counties (2010-2017)," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(4).
    11. Marco Airaudo & Luca Bossi, 2017. "Consumption Externalities And Monetary Policy With Limited Asset Market Participation," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(1), pages 601-623, January.
    12. Till Treeck, 2014. "Did Inequality Cause The U.S. Financial Crisis?," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(3), pages 421-448, July.
    13. Thomas Aronsson & Olof Johansson-Stenman, 2014. "When Samuelson Met Veblen Abroad: National and Global Public Good Provision when Social Comparisons Matter," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 81(322), pages 224-243, April.
    14. Engelbert Stockhammer & Rafael Wildauer, 2016. "Debt-driven growth? Wealth, distribution and demand in OECD countries," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 40(6), pages 1609-1634.
    15. Jon Wisman, 2011. "Inequality, Social Respectability, Political Power, and Environmental Devastation," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(4), pages 877-900.
    16. Coibion, Olivier & Gorodnichenko, Yuriy & Kudlyak, Marianna & Mondragon, John, 2014. "Does Greater Inequality Lead to More Household Borrowing? New Evidence from Household Data," IZA Discussion Papers 7910, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    17. Bishnu, Monisankar, 2013. "Linking consumption externalities with optimal accumulation of human and physical capital and intergenerational transfers," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 148(2), pages 720-742.
    18. Thomas Aronsson & Sugata Ghosh & Ronald Wendner, 2023. "Positional preferences and efficiency in a dynamic economy," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 61(2), pages 311-337, August.
    19. Irakli Japaridze & Nagham Sayour, 2021. "Dying from envy: The role of inequality," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(6), pages 1374-1392, June.
    20. Aronsson, Thomas & Johansson-Stenman, Olof, 2014. "Positional preferences in time and space: Optimal income taxation with dynamic social comparisons," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 1-23.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Consumption externalities; Consumption taxation; Context; Market failure; Relative income; Safety regulation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D62 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Externalities
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • H21 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Efficiency; Optimal Taxation
    • H23 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Externalities; Redistributive Effects; Environmental Taxes and Subsidies
    • J28 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Safety; Job Satisfaction; Related Public Policy

    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:eee:jeborg:v:126:y:2016:i:pb:p:130-136. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 bibliographic 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.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jebo .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.