IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/agribz/v24y2008i1p1-15.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Retailers' response to wholesale price changes: new evidence from scanner-based quantity-weighted beef prices

Author

Listed:
  • Christian Rojas

    (Department of Resource Economics, University of Massachusetts-Amherst, Amherst, MA 01003)

  • Alexandra Andino

    (Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061)

  • Wayne D. Purcell

    (Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061)

Abstract

Retailers are often criticized for a slow response in retail prices to changes in wholesale beef prices. The unresponsiveness, especially when wholesale and farm prices are declining, is seen as a lack of competitiveness and as a reason for congressional action to regulate behavior of processors or retailers. The validity of the historical analyses of retailer price responsiveness is questionable, however. Traditional Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) retail beef prices biased upward and do not account for large volumes sold at discounted prices. This article uses newly available scanner-based quantity-weighted retail prices to suggest that retailers' response to changes in wholesale beef prices is significantly larger and possibly quicker than is shown by traditional BLS measures of retail prices. Recent efforts to prompt legislation to regulate how firms behave along the beef supply chain, which are based only on arguments that retailers are not responding to price changes at the wholesale level, may be inappropriate. [L110, L660, D400] © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Suggested Citation

  • Christian Rojas & Alexandra Andino & Wayne D. Purcell, 2008. "Retailers' response to wholesale price changes: new evidence from scanner-based quantity-weighted beef prices," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 24(1), pages 1-15.
  • Handle: RePEc:wly:agribz:v:24:y:2008:i:1:p:1-15
    DOI: 10.1002/agr.20143
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1002/agr.20143
    File Function: Link to full text; subscription required
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/agr.20143?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Brent R. Moulton, 1996. "Bias in the Consumer Price Index: What Is the Evidence?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 10(4), pages 159-177, Fall.
    2. Ronald Cotterill & Leonard Egan & William Buckhold, 2001. "Beyond Illinois Brick: The Law and Economics of Cost Pass-Through in the ADM Price Fixing Case," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 18(1), pages 45-52, February.
    3. Christine Lensing & Wayne D. Purcell, 2006. "Impact of Mandatory Price Reporting Requirements on Level, Variability, and Elasticity Parameter Estimations for Retail Beef Prices," Review of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 28(2), pages 229-239.
    4. Venus Khim-Sen Liew, 2004. "Which Lag Length Selection Criteria Should We Employ?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 3(33), pages 1-9.
    5. Barry K. Goodwin & Matthew T. Holt, 1999. "Price Transmission and Asymmetric Adjustment in the U.S. Beef Sector," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 81(3), pages 630-637.
    6. Granger, C W J & Lee, T H, 1989. "Investigation of Production, Sales and Inventory Relationships Using Multicointegration and Non-symmetric Error Correction Models," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 4(S), pages 145-159, Supplemen.
    7. Christine Lensing & Wayne D. Purcell, 2006. "Impact of Mandatory Price Reporting Requirements on Level, Variability, and Elasticity Parameter Estimations for Retail Beef Prices," Review of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 28(2), pages 229-239.
    8. Søren Johansen, 2005. "Interpretation of Cointegrating Coefficients in the Cointegrated Vector Autoregressive Model," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 67(1), pages 93-104, February.
    9. Lutkepohl, Helmut & Reimers, Hans-Eggert, 1992. "Impulse response analysis of cointegrated systems," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 53-78, January.
    10. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:3:y:2004:i:33:p:1-9 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Leonard I. Nakamura, 1998. "The retail revolution and food-price mismeasurement," Business Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, issue May, pages 3-14.
    12. MacDonald, James M., 1995. "Consumer Price Index Overstates Food-Price Inflation," Food Review/ National Food Review, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, vol. 18(3), September.
    13. Jerry Hausman & Ephraim Leibtag, 2009. "CPI Bias from Supercenters: Does the BLS Know that Wal-Mart Exists?," NBER Chapters, in: Price Index Concepts and Measurement, pages 203-231, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Johansen, Soren, 1988. "Statistical analysis of cointegration vectors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 12(2-3), pages 231-254.
    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. Peter Berck & Ephraim Leibtag & Alex Solis & Sofia Villas-Boas, 2009. "Patterns of Pass-through of Commodity Price Shocks to Retail Prices," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1456-1461.
    2. Erdal Erol & Sayed H. Saghaian, 2022. "The COVID-19 Pandemic and Dynamics of Price Adjustment in the U.S. Beef Sector," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(8), pages 1-14, April.
    3. Schroeder, Ted C & Tonsor, Glynn T & Schulz, Lee L & Johnson, Bradley J & Sommers, Christopher, 2021. "USDA ERS Meat Price Spread Data Product Review," Contractor and Cooperator Reports 327349, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    4. Taylor, Mykel R. & Tonsor, Glynn T., 2013. "Revealed Demand for Country-of-Origin Labeling of Meat in the United States," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 38(2), pages 1-13, August.
    5. Solomon Odiase & Sayed H. Saghaian, 2022. "Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Vertical Price Transmission in the U.S. Fresh Banana Market," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(10), pages 1-16, May.

    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. Monia Ben-Kaabia & José M. Gil & Mehrez Ameur, 2005. "Vertical integration and non-linear price adjustments: The Spanish poultry sector," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 21(2), pages 253-271.
    2. Pozo, Veronica F. & Bachmeier, Lance J. & Schroeder, Ted C., 2021. "Are there price asymmetries in the U.S. beef market?," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 21(C).
    3. Rahman, Mohammad Chhiddikur, 2020. "Welfare Impact of Asymmetric Price Transmission on Bangladesh Rice Consumers," EconStor Theses, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, number 242248, January.
    4. Rahman, Mohammad Chhiddikur, 2018. "Welfare Impact of Asymmetric Price Transmission on Bangladesh Rice Consumers," EconStor Theses, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, number 251114, January.
    5. Ankamah-Yeboah, Isaac, 2012. "Spatial Price Transmission in the Regional Maize Markets in Ghana," MPRA Paper 49720, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Bloch, Harry & Rafiq, Shuddhasattwa & Salim, Ruhul, 2015. "Economic growth with coal, oil and renewable energy consumption in China: Prospects for fuel substitution," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 104-115.
    7. Candelon, Bertrand & Lieb, Lenard, 2013. "Fiscal policy in good and bad times," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 37(12), pages 2679-2694.
    8. Islam Hassouneh & Teresa Serra & José M. Gil, 2010. "Price transmission in the Spanish bovine sector: the BSE effect," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 41(1), pages 33-42, January.
    9. Bagnai, Alberto & Mongeau Ospina, Christian Alexander, 2015. "Long- and short-run price asymmetries and hysteresis in the Italian gasoline market," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 41-50.
    10. Arestis, Philip & Mariscal, Iris Biefang-Frisancho, 1998. "Capital shortages and asymmetries in UK unemployment," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 189-204, June.
    11. Ramona Dumitriu & Razvan Stefanescu, 2015. "The Relationship Between Romanian Exports And Economic Growth After The Adhesion To European Union," Risk in Contemporary Economy, "Dunarea de Jos" University of Galati, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, pages 17-26.
    12. Garg, Bhavesh & Prabheesh, K.P., 2021. "Testing the intertemporal sustainability of current account in the presence of endogenous structural breaks: Evidence from the top deficit countries," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 365-379.
    13. Catherine Bruneau & Eric Jondeau, 1999. "Long‐run Causality, with an Application to International Links Between Long‐term Interest Rates," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 61(4), pages 545-568, November.
    14. Lambert, David K. & Miljkovic, Dragan, 2010. "The sources of variability in U.S. food prices," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 210-222, March.
    15. Çetin, Tamer & Yasin Eryigit, Kadir, 2013. "The economic effects of government regulation: Evidence from the New York taxicab market," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 25(C), pages 169-177.
    16. Gabriella Deborah Legrenzi & Costas Milas, 2010. "Spend-and-Tax Adjustments and the Sustainability of the Government's Intertemporal Budget Constraint," CESifo Working Paper Series 2926, CESifo.
    17. Ahmed, Osama & Serra, Teresa, 2015. "Evaluate the economic consequences of revenue insurance programs in Spain using copula models. The case of orange and apple," 2015 Conference, August 9-14, 2015, Milan, Italy 212522, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    18. Zouheir Ahmed Mighri & Majid Ibrahim Alsaggaf, 2019. "Asymmetric Threshold Cointegration and Nonlinear Adjustment between Oil Prices and Financial Stress," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 9(3), pages 87-105.
    19. Stavros Degiannakis & Christos Floros, 2010. "Hedge Ratios in South African Stock Index Futures," Journal of Emerging Market Finance, Institute for Financial Management and Research, vol. 9(3), pages 285-304, December.
    20. Pedro José Pérez Vázquez, 2003. "Fuentes de variabilidad en las principales economías occidentales," Investigaciones Economicas, Fundación SEPI, vol. 27(3), pages 565-591, September.

    More about this item

    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:wly:agribz:v:24:y:2008:i:1:p:1-15. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1520-6297 .

    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.