[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/vfsc19/203555.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Information in a Monopolist's Credence Good Market

Author

Listed:
  • Jost, Peter-J.
  • Reik, Steffen
  • Ressi, Anna
Abstract
Credence goods markets, such as those for car repairs and medical treatments, are generally characterized by an ex-ante and ex-post information asymmetry between the uninformed buyer and the informed seller. Previous literature demonstrates that efficiency and fraud in a monopolist credence goods market are crucially determined by two key assumptions concerning the verifiability of the quality provided and the expert's liability. In this paper, we identify the information distribution among customers as a third important determinant. Contrary to basic intuition, we find that improving the level of customers' information might actually lead to welfare losses. Further, we highlight the supremacy of the assumption regarding the expert's liability for determining whether informed customers have real effects on market outcomes. On the other hand and in contrast to traditional models, the verifiability of the quality provided is only of secondary importance.

Suggested Citation

  • Jost, Peter-J. & Reik, Steffen & Ressi, Anna, 2019. "Information in a Monopolist's Credence Good Market," VfS Annual Conference 2019 (Leipzig): 30 Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall - Democracy and Market Economy 203555, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:vfsc19:203555
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/203555/1/VfS-2019-pid-27346.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Timothy J. Feddersen & Thomas W. Gilligan, 2001. "Saints and Markets: Activists and the Supply of Credence Goods," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(1), pages 149-171, March.
    2. Loukas Balafoutas & Adrian Beck & Rudolf Kerschbamer & Matthias Sutter, 2013. "What Drives Taxi Drivers? A Field Experiment on Fraud in a Market for Credence Goods," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 80(3), pages 876-891.
    3. Winand Emons, 1997. "Credence Goods and Fraudelent Experts," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 28(1), pages 107-119, Spring.
    4. Yuk-fai Fong, 2005. "When Do Experts Cheat and Whom Do They Target?," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 36(1), pages 113-130, Spring.
    5. Wolfgang Pesendorfer & Asher Wolinsky, 2003. "Second Opinions and Price Competition: Inefficiency in the Market for Expert Advice," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 70(2), pages 417-437.
    6. Asher Wolinsky, 1993. "Competition in a Market for Informed Experts' Services," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 24(3), pages 380-398, Autumn.
    7. Nelson, Phillip, 1970. "Information and Consumer Behavior," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 78(2), pages 311-329, March-Apr.
    8. Agarwal, Ritu & Liu, Che-Wei & Prasad, Kislaya, 2019. "Personal research, second opinions, and the diagnostic effort of experts," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 44-61.
    9. Bester, Helmut & Ouyang, Yaofu, 2018. "Optimal procurement of a credence good under limited liability," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 96-129.
    10. Darby, Michael R & Karni, Edi, 1973. "Free Competition and the Optimal Amount of Fraud," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 16(1), pages 67-88, April.
    11. Taylor, Curtis R, 1995. "The Economics of Breakdowns, Checkups, and Cures," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(1), pages 53-74, February.
    12. Pitchik, Carolyn & Schotter, Andrew, 1987. "Honesty in a Model of Strategic Information Transmission," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(5), pages 1032-1036, December.
    13. Uwe Dulleck & Rudolf Kerschbamer & Matthias Sutter, 2011. "The Economics of Credence Goods: An Experiment on the Role of Liability, Verifiability, Reputation, and Competition," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(2), pages 526-555, April.
    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. Bester, Helmut & Ouyang, Yaofu, 2018. "Optimal procurement of a credence good under limited liability," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 96-129.
    2. Jost, Peter-J. & Reik, Steffen & Ressi, Anna, 2021. "The information paradox in a monopolist’s credence goods market," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    3. Liu, Ting & Ma, Ching-to Albert, 2024. "Equilibrium information in credence goods," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 84-101.
    4. Agarwal, Ritu & Liu, Che-Wei & Prasad, Kislaya, 2019. "Personal research, second opinions, and the diagnostic effort of experts," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 44-61.
    5. Helmut Bester & Matthias Dahm, 2018. "Credence Goods, Costly Diagnosis and Subjective Evaluation," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(611), pages 1367-1394, June.
    6. Dominik Erharter, 2012. "Credence goods markets, distributional preferences and the role of institutions," Working Papers 2012-11, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    7. Schneider, Tim & Meub, Lukas & Bizer, Kilian, 2021. "Consumer information in a market for expert services: Experimental evidence," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    8. Dulleck, Uwe & Kerschbamer, Rudolf & Konovalov, Alexander, 2014. "Too Much or Too Little? Price-Discrimination in a Market for Credence Goods," Working Papers in Economics 582, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics, revised Apr 2014.
    9. Cao, Yiran & Chen, Yongmin & Ding, Yucheng & Zhang, Tianle, 2022. "Search and competition in expert markets," MPRA Paper 122509, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 27 Oct 2024.
    10. Cao, Yiran & Chen, Yongmin & Ding, Yucheng & Zhang, Tianle, 2022. "Search and competition in expert markets," MPRA Paper 114170, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. David Bardey & Denis Gromb & David Martimort & Jérôme Pouyet, 2020. "Controlling Sellers Who Provide Advice: Regulation and Competition," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 68(3), pages 409-444, September.
    12. Momsen, Katharina, 2021. "Recommendations in credence goods markets with horizontal product differentiation," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 19-38.
    13. Fang Liu & Alexander Rasch & Marco A. Schwarz & Christian Waibel, 2020. "The role of diagnostic ability in markets for expert services," Working Papers 2020-07, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    14. Katharina Momsen & Markus Ohndorf, 2022. "Seller Opportunism in Credence Good Markets – The Role of Market Conditions," Working Papers 2022-10, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    15. Dulleck, Uwe & Kerschbamer, Rudolf, 2009. "Experts vs. discounters: Consumer free-riding and experts withholding advice in markets for credence goods," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 15-23, January.
    16. Balafoutas, Loukas & Kerschbamer, Rudolf, 2020. "Credence goods in the literature: What the past fifteen years have taught us about fraud, incentives, and the role of institutions," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 26(C).
    17. Vincze, János, 2010. "Miért és mitől védjük a fogyasztókat?. Aszimmetrikus információ és/vagy korlátozott racionalitás [Asymmetric information and/or bounded rationality: why are consumers protected and from what?]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(9), pages 725-752.
    18. Maarten Janssen & Alexei Parakhonyak, 2011. "Sårvice Refusal in Regulated Markets for Credence Goods," HSE Working papers WP BRP 08/EC/2011, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    19. Uwe Dulleck & Rudolf Kerschbamer, 2003. "Price Discrimination in Markets for Experts´ Services," Vienna Economics Papers vie0312, University of Vienna, Department of Economics.
    20. Hyndman, Kyle & Ozerturk, Saltuk, 2011. "Consumer information in a market for expert services," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 80(3), pages 628-640.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Credence Goods; Liability; Verifiability; Information.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D42 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Monopoly
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • L0 - Industrial Organization - - General
    • L10 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - General
    • L15 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Information and Product Quality
    • I11 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Analysis of Health Care Markets

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:zbw:vfsc19:203555. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfsocea.html .

    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.