[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/indorg/v53y2017icp170-214.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Keeping it fresh: Strategic product redesigns and welfare

Author

Listed:
  • Blonigen, Bruce A.
  • Knittel, Christopher R.
  • Soderbery, Anson
Abstract
Product redesigns happen across virtually all types of products, yet there is little evidence on the market and welfare effects of redesigns. We develop a model of redesign decisions in a dynamic oligopoly model and use it to analyze redesign activity in the U.S. automobile market. We find automobile model redesigns are frequent despite an estimated average cost around $1 billion. Our estimates also suggest that redesigns lead to large increases in profits and welfare due to the strong preferences consumers have for redesigns. We show that welfare would be improved if redesign competition were reduced, allowing redesign activity to be more responsive to the planned obsolescence channel. The net effect of these changes would reduce total redesigns by roughly 10%, increasing total welfare by roughly 3%. The high valuation that consumers put on newly-designed models drives frequent redesigns and gives automobile manufacturers fairly substantial market power, with a 2-to-1 ratio of firm profits to consumer surplus.

Suggested Citation

  • Blonigen, Bruce A. & Knittel, Christopher R. & Soderbery, Anson, 2017. "Keeping it fresh: Strategic product redesigns and welfare," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 170-214.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:indorg:v:53:y:2017:i:c:p:170-214
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ijindorg.2017.04.003
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167718716301813
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ijindorg.2017.04.003?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. Gautam Gowrisankaran & Marc Rysman, 2012. "Dynamics of Consumer Demand for New Durable Goods," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 120(6), pages 1173-1219.
    2. Ronald L. Goettler & Brett R. Gordon, 2011. "Does AMD Spur Intel to Innovate More?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 119(6), pages 1141-1200.
    3. Christian Broda & David E. Weinstein, 2006. "Globalization and the Gains From Variety," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 121(2), pages 541-585.
    4. Jiawei Chen & Susanna Esteban & Matthew Shum, 2010. "How much competition is a secondary market?," Working Papers 2010-06, Instituto Madrileño de Estudios Avanzados (IMDEA) Ciencias Sociales.
    5. Amil Petrin, 2002. "Quantifying the Benefits of New Products: The Case of the Minivan," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 110(4), pages 705-729, August.
    6. Patrick Bajari & C. Lanier Benkard & Jonathan Levin, 2007. "Estimating Dynamic Models of Imperfect Competition," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 75(5), pages 1331-1370, September.
    7. Srisuma, Sorawoot, 2010. "Estimation of structural optimization models: a note on identification," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 58071, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    8. Kenneth L. Judd, 1998. "Numerical Methods in Economics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262100711, April.
    9. Ulrich Doraszelski & Mark Satterthwaite, 2010. "Computable Markov‐perfect industry dynamics," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 41(2), pages 215-243, June.
    10. Andrew Sweeting, 2007. "Dynamic Product Repositioning in Differentiated Product Markets: The Case of Format Switching in the Commercial Radio Industry," NBER Working Papers 13522, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Christopher R. Knittel, 2011. "Automobiles on Steroids: Product Attribute Trade-Offs and Technological Progress in the Automobile Sector," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(7), pages 3368-3399, December.
    12. Feenstra, Robert C, 1994. "New Product Varieties and the Measurement of International Prices," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(1), pages 157-177, March.
    13. Bruce A. Blonigen & Anson Soderbery, 2019. "Measuring the Benefits of Foreign Product Variety with an Accurate Variety Set," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Foreign Direct Investment, chapter 15, pages 501-538, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    14. Berry, Steven & Levinsohn, James & Pakes, Ariel, 1995. "Automobile Prices in Market Equilibrium," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 63(4), pages 841-890, July.
    15. Robert H. Porter & Peter Sattler, 1999. "Patterns of Trade in the Market for Used Durables: Theory and Evidence," NBER Working Papers 7149, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. Susanna Esteban & Matthew Shum, 2007. "Durable-goods oligopoly with secondary markets: the case of automobiles," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 38(2), pages 332-354, June.
    17. Aviv Nevo, 2003. "New Products, Quality Changes, and Welfare Measures Computed from Estimated Demand Systems," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(2), pages 266-275, May.
    18. Stephen P. Ryan, 2012. "The Costs of Environmental Regulation in a Concentrated Industry," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 80(3), pages 1019-1061, May.
    19. Paul A. Grout & In-Uck Park, 2005. "Competitive Planned Obsolescence," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 36(3), pages 596-612, Autumn.
    20. Myrto Kalouptsidi, 2014. "Time to Build and Fluctuations in Bulk Shipping," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(2), pages 564-608, February.
    21. Toshiaki Iizuka, 2007. "An Empirical Analysis of Planned Obsolescence," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(1), pages 191-226, March.
    22. Arthur Fishman & Rafael Rob, 2000. "Product Innovation by a Durable-Good Monpoly," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 31(2), pages 237-252, Summer.
    23. Swan, Peter L, 1970. "Durability of Consumption Goods," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 60(5), pages 884-894, December.
    24. Coase, Ronald H, 1972. "Durability and Monopoly," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 15(1), pages 143-149, April.
    25. Andrew Sweeting, 2013. "Dynamic Product Positioning in Differentiated Product Markets: The Effect of Fees for Musical Performance Rights on the Commercial Radio Industry," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 81(5), pages 1763-1803, September.
    26. Przemys?aw Jeziorski, 2014. "Effects of Mergers in Two-Sided Markets: The US Radio Industry," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(4), pages 35-73, November.
    27. Jiawei Chen & Susanna Esteban & Matthew Shum, 2013. "When Do Secondary Markets Harm Firms?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(7), pages 2911-2934, December.
    28. Devavrat Purohit, 1992. "Exploring the Relationship Between the Markets for New and Used Durable Goods: The Case of Automobiles," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 11(2), pages 154-167.
    29. Judith Chevalier & Austan Goolsbee, 2009. "Are Durable Goods Consumers Forward-Looking? Evidence from College Textbooks," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(4), pages 1853-1884.
    30. Christopher R. Knittel & Konstantinos Metaxoglou, 2014. "Estimation of Random-Coefficient Demand Models: Two Empiricists' Perspective," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 96(1), pages 34-59, March.
    31. Steven T. Berry, 1994. "Estimating Discrete-Choice Models of Product Differentiation," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 25(2), pages 242-262, Summer.
    32. Miller, H Laurence, Jr, 1974. "On Killing off the Market for Used Textbooks and the Relationship between Markets for New and Secondhand Goods," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(3), pages 612-619, May/June.
    33. Waldman, Michael, 1996. "Durable Goods Pricing When Quality Matters," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 69(4), pages 489-510, October.
    34. Michael Waldman, 2003. "Durable Goods Theory for Real World Markets," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 17(1), pages 131-154, Winter.
    35. Michael Waldman, 1993. "A New Perspective on Planned Obsolescence," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(1), pages 273-283.
    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. Leard, Benjamin & McConnell, Virginia, 2015. "New Markets for Pollution and Energy Efficiency: Credit Trading under Automobile Greenhouse Gas and Fuel Economy StandardsAbstract: Recent changes to the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standard," RFF Working Paper Series dp-15-16, Resources for the Future.
    2. Tobias Salz & Emanuel Vespa, 2020. "Estimating dynamic games of oligopolistic competition: an experimental investigation," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 51(2), pages 447-469, June.
    3. Mathias Reynaert, 2021. "Abatement Strategies and the Cost of Environmental Regulation: Emission Standards on the European Car Market," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 88(1), pages 454-488.
    4. Kahn, Matthew E. & Walsh, Randall, 2015. "Cities and the Environment," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 405-465, Elsevier.
    5. Linn, Joshua, "undated". "Explaining the Adoption of Diesel Fuel Passenger Cars in Europe," RFF Working Paper Series dp-14-08-rev, Resources for the Future.
    6. Noton, Carlos, 2016. "Structural estimation of price adjustment costs in the European car market," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 105-147.
    7. Alex Burnap & John R. Hauser & Artem Timoshenko, 2019. "Product Aesthetic Design: A Machine Learning Augmentation," Papers 1907.07786, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2022.
    8. Thomas Klier & Joshua Linn & Yichen C. Zhou, 2020. "The effects of fuel prices and vehicle sales on fuel‐saving technology adoption in passenger vehicles," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(3), pages 543-578, July.
    9. Siqi Liu & Bhoomija Ranjan & Benjamin Reed Shiller, 2020. "Are Coarse Ratings Fine? Applications to Crashworthiness Ratings," Working Papers 132, Brandeis University, Department of Economics and International Business School.
    10. Daniel Chaves, 2022. "Market Power, Taxation and Product Variety in the Brazilian Automobile Industry," University of Western Ontario, Departmental Research Report Series 20227, University of Western Ontario, Department of Economics.
    11. Friberg, Richard & Romahn, André, 2015. "Divestiture requirements as a tool for competition policy: A case from the Swedish beer market," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 1-18.
    12. Linn, Joshua, 2023. "Emissions Standards and Electric Vehicle Targets for Passenger Vehicles," RFF Working Paper Series 23-05, Resources for the Future.
    13. Liu, An-Hsiang & Siebert, Ralph B., 2022. "The competitive effects of declining entry costs over time: Evidence from the static random access memory market," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    14. Gaia Rubera, 2015. "Design Innovativeness and Product Sales' Evolution," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 34(1), pages 98-115, January.
    15. Linn, Joshua, 2014. "Explaining the Adoption of Diesel Fuel Passenger Cars in Europe," Discussion Papers dp-14-08, Resources For the Future.
    16. Leard, Benjamin & Linn, Joshua & Springel, Katalin, 2020. "Have US Fuel Economy and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards Improved Social Welfare?," RFF Working Paper Series 20-06, Resources for the Future.
    17. An-Hsiang Liu & Ralph Siebert, 2020. "The Competitive Effects of Declining Entry Costs over Time: Evidence from the Static Random Access Memory Market," CESifo Working Paper Series 8552, CESifo.
    18. Yuto Omae, 2023. "Effects of Exploration Weight and Overtuned Kernel Parameters on Gaussian Process-Based Bayesian Optimization Search Performance," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 11(14), pages 1-13, July.
    19. Leard, Benjamin & Linn, Joshua & Springel, Katalin, 2023. "Vehicle Attribute Tradeoffs and the Distributional Effects of US Fuel Economy and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards," RFF Working Paper Series 23-04, Resources for the Future.

    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. Masakazu Ishihara & Andrew T. Ching, 2019. "Dynamic Demand for New and Used Durable Goods Without Physical Depreciation: The Case of Japanese Video Games," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 38(3), pages 392-416, May.
    2. Chen, Jiawei & Esteban, Susanna & Shum, Matthew, 2008. "Demand and supply estimation biases due to omission of durability," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 147(2), pages 247-257, December.
    3. Victor Aguirregabiria & Margaret Slade, 2017. "Empirical models of firms and industries," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 50(5), pages 1445-1488, December.
    4. Victor Aguirregabiria & Victor Aguirregabiria & Aviv Nevo & Aviv Nevo, 2010. "Recent Developments in Empirical IO: Dynamic Demand and Dynamic Games," Working Papers tecipa-419, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    5. Judith Chevalier & Austan Goolsbee, 2009. "Are Durable Goods Consumers Forward-Looking? Evidence from College Textbooks," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(4), pages 1853-1884.
    6. Victor Aguirregabiria & Gustavo Vicentini, 2006. "Dynamic Spatial Competition Between Multi-Store Firms," Working Papers tecipa-253, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    7. Michael Waldman, 2003. "Durable Goods Theory for Real World Markets," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 17(1), pages 131-154, Winter.
    8. Eric Brouillat, 2015. "Live fast, die young? Investigating product life spans and obsolescence in an agent-based model," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 447-473, April.
    9. Baojun Jiang & Lin Tian, 2018. "Collaborative Consumption: Strategic and Economic Implications of Product Sharing," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(3), pages 1171-1188, March.
    10. Eric Brouillat, 2011. "Durability of consumption goods and market competition: an agent-based modelling," Post-Print hal-00780254, HAL.
    11. Linli Xu & Jorge M. Silva-Risso & Kenneth C. Wilbur, 2018. "Dynamic Quality Ladder Model Predictions in Nonrandom Holdout Samples," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(7), pages 3187-3207, July.
    12. Aamir Rafique Hashmi & Johannes Van Biesebroeck, 2016. "The Relationship between Market Structure and Innovation in Industry Equilibrium: A Case Study of the Global Automobile Industry," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(1), pages 192-208, March.
    13. Aguirregabiria, Victor & Ho, Chun-Yu, 2012. "A dynamic oligopoly game of the US airline industry: Estimation and policy experiments," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 168(1), pages 156-173.
    14. Pasquale Schiraldi, 2006. "Second-Hand Markets and Collusion by Manufacturers of Semidurable Goods," Boston University - Department of Economics - Working Papers Series WP2006-028, Boston University - Department of Economics.
    15. Maican, Florin G., 2012. "From Boom to Bust and Back Again: A dynamic analysis of IT services," Working Papers in Economics 543, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    16. Gerstle, Ari D. & Waldman, Michael, 2016. "Mergers in durable-goods industries: A re-examination of market power and welfare effects," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(4), pages 677-692.
    17. Eric W. Bond & Toshiaki Iizuka, 2014. "Durable Goods Price Cycles: Theory And Evidence From The Textbook Market," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 52(2), pages 518-538, April.
    18. Christopher R. Knittel & Konstantinos Metaxoglou, 2008. "Estimation of Random Coefficient Demand Models: Challenges, Difficulties and Warnings," NBER Working Papers 14080, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Coublucq, Daniel, 2013. "Demand estimation with selection bias: A dynamic game approach with an application to the US railroad industry," DICE Discussion Papers 94, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE).
    20. Pinar Karaca-Mandic, 2011. "Role of complementarities in technology adoption: The case of DVD players," Quantitative Marketing and Economics (QME), Springer, vol. 9(2), pages 179-210, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Dynamic oligopoly; Automobile redesign; Structural estimation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L11 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Production, Pricing, and Market Structure; Size Distribution of Firms
    • L23 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Organization of Production
    • L62 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Manufacturing - - - Automobiles; Other Transportation Equipment; Related Parts and Equipment

    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:indorg:v:53:y:2017:i:c:p:170-214. 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/inca/505551 .

    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.