IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/applec/v43y2011i30p4707-4721.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does responsive pricing smooth demand shocks?

Author

Listed:
  • Pascal Courty
  • Mario Pagliero

Abstract

Using data from a unique pricing experiment, we investigate Vickrey's conjecture that responsive pricing can be used to smooth both predictable and unpredictable demand shocks. Our evidence shows that increasing the responsiveness of price to demand conditions reduces the magnitude of deviations in capacity utilization rates from a pre-determined target level. A 10% increase in price variability leads to a decrease in the variability of capacity utilization rates between 2% and 6%. We discuss implications for the use of demand-side incentives to deal with congestible resources.

Suggested Citation

  • Pascal Courty & Mario Pagliero, 2011. "Does responsive pricing smooth demand shocks?," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(30), pages 4707-4721.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:applec:v:43:y:2011:i:30:p:4707-4721
    DOI: 10.1080/00036846.2010.498350
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00036846.2010.498350
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/00036846.2010.498350?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 look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Courty, Pascal & Pagliero, Mario, 2010. "Price variation antagonism and firm pricing policies," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 235-249, August.
    2. Brownstone, David & Ghosh, Arindam & Golob, Thomas F. & Kazimi, Camilla & Van Amelsfort, Dirk, 2003. "Drivers' willingness-to-pay to reduce travel time: evidence from the San Diego I-15 congestion pricing project," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 373-387, May.
    3. Robert H. Patrick & Frank A. Wolak, 2001. "Estimating the Customer-Level Demand for Electricity Under Real-Time Market Prices," NBER Working Papers 8213, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Pascal Courty & Mario Pagliero, 2008. "Responsive pricing," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 34(2), pages 235-259, February.
    5. Harris, Milton & Raviv, Artur, 1981. "A Theory of Monopoly Pricing Schemes with Demand Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(3), pages 347-365, June.
    6. Thomas Taylor & Peter Schwarz, 2000. "Advance notice of real-time electricity prices," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 28(4), pages 478-488, December.
    7. Aubin, Christophe, et al, 1995. "Real-Time Pricing of Electricity for Residential Customers: Econometric Analysis of an Experiment," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 10(S), pages 171-191, Suppl. De.
    8. Kahneman, Daniel & Knetsch, Jack L & Thaler, Richard, 1986. "Fairness as a Constraint on Profit Seeking: Entitlements in the Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(4), pages 728-741, September.
    9. William Vickrey, 1971. "Responsive Pricing of Public Utility Services," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 2(1), pages 337-346, Spring.
    10. Herriges, Joseph A, et al, 1993. "The Response of Industrial Customers to Electric Rates Based upon Dynamic Marginal Costs," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 75(3), pages 446-454, August.
    11. Peter M. Schwarz & Thomas N. Taylor & Matthew Birmingham & Shana L. Dardan, 2002. "Industrial Response to Electricity Real-Time Prices: Short Run and Long Run," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 40(4), pages 597-610, October.
    12. Borenstein, Severin & Rose, Nancy L, 1994. "Competition and Price Dispersion in the U.S. Airline Industry," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 102(4), pages 653-683, August.
    13. Eugenio J. Miravete, 2003. "Choosing the Wrong Calling Plan? Ignorance and Learning," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 297-310, March.
    14. Crew, Michael A & Fernando, Chitru S & Kleindorfer, Paul R, 1995. "The Theory of Peak-Load Pricing: A Survey," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 8(3), pages 215-248, November.
    15. Koenker, Roger W & Bassett, Gilbert, Jr, 1978. "Regression Quantiles," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 46(1), pages 33-50, January.
    16. C. Robin Lindsey & Erik T. Verhoef, 2000. "Traffic Congestion and Congestion Pricing," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 00-101/3, Tinbergen Institute.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dobromir Stoyanov, 2021. "Marketing of vending channels: a case of French university campuses," Post-Print hal-03812781, HAL.

    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. Courty, Pascal & Pagliero, Mario, 2003. "Does Responsive Pricing Increase Efficiency? Evidence from Pricing Experiments in an Internet Café," CEPR Discussion Papers 4149, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Courty, Pascal & Pagliero, Mario, 2010. "Price variation antagonism and firm pricing policies," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 235-249, August.
    3. Lindsey, Robin, 2011. "State-dependent congestion pricing with reference-dependent preferences," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 45(10), pages 1501-1526.
    4. Pascal Courty & Mario Pagliero, 2008. "Responsive pricing," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 34(2), pages 235-259, February.
    5. Pascal Courty & Mario Pagliero, 2008. "Do Consumers Care about how Prices are Set?," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(1), pages 27-43.
    6. Lindsey, Robin, 2009. "Cost recovery from congestion tolls with random capacity and demand," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 16-24, July.
    7. Schlereth, Christian & Skiera, Bernd & Schulz, Fabian, 2018. "Why do consumers prefer static instead of dynamic pricing plans? An empirical study for a better understanding of the low preferences for time-variant pricing plans," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 269(3), pages 1165-1179.
    8. Zhou, Yang & Ma, Rong & Su, Yun & Wu, Libo, 2019. "Too big to change: How heterogeneous firms respond to time-of-use electricity price," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 58(C).
    9. Wai Choi & Anindya Sen & Adam White, 2011. "Response of industrial customers to hourly pricing in Ontario’s deregulated electricity market," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 40(3), pages 303-323, December.
    10. Tobias Gesche, 2022. "Reference‐price shifts and customer antagonism: Evidence from reviews for online auctions," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(3), pages 558-578, August.
    11. Grimm, Veronika & Schewe, Lars & Schmidt, Martin & Zöttl, Gregor, 2017. "Uniqueness of market equilibrium on a network: A peak-load pricing approach," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 261(3), pages 971-983.
    12. Hunt Allcott, 2012. "The Smart Grid, Entry, and Imperfect Competition in Electricity Markets," NBER Working Papers 18071, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Derya Eryilmaz, Timothy M. Smith, and Frances R. Homans, 2017. "Price Responsiveness in Electricity Markets: Implications for Demand Response in the Midwest," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 1).
    14. Faruqui, A. & Hajos, A. & Hledik, R.M. & Newell, S.A., 2010. "Fostering economic demand response in the Midwest ISO," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 1544-1552.
    15. Schuster, Emanuel & Spann, Martin, 2024. "Pay today, or delay the pay: Consumer preference for double flat-rate pricing plans," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 182(C).
    16. Hendrik Sonnabend, 2016. "Fairness constraints on profit-seeking: evidence from the German club concert industry," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 40(4), pages 529-545, November.
    17. Boom, Anette & Schwenen, Sebastian, 2012. "Real-time Pricing in Power Markets: Who Gains?," VfS Annual Conference 2012 (Goettingen): New Approaches and Challenges for the Labor Market of the 21st Century 66062, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    18. Neuteleers, Stijn & Mulder, Machiel & Hindriks, Frank, 2017. "Assessing fairness of dynamic grid tariffs," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 111-120.
    19. Christos Genakos & Tommaso Valletti & Frank Verboven, 2018. "Evaluating market consolidation in mobile communications," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 33(93), pages 45-100.
    20. Escobari, Diego, 2009. "Systematic peak-load pricing, congestion premia and demand diverting: Empirical evidence," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 103(1), pages 59-61, April.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D01 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Microeconomic Behavior: Underlying Principles
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • L11 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Production, Pricing, and Market Structure; Size Distribution of Firms
    • L86 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Information and Internet Services; Computer Software

    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:taf:applec:v:43:y:2011:i:30:p:4707-4721. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RAEC20 .

    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.