Quality certification programs help consumers to identify high-quality products or sellers in markets with information asymmetries. Using data from eBay UK's online marketplace, we study how certification's impact on consumer demand varies with market- and seller-level attributes, exploiting...

To study whether consumers will pay more for products that generate charitable donations, we analyze data from eBay on charity and noncharity auctions of otherwise identical products. Charity prices are 6 percent higher, on average, than noncharity prices. Bids below the closing price are also...

The danger of alcohol- and drug-impaired driving implies that policies that reduce substance abuse can save lives. We study this issue in small U.S. counties where access to substance abuse treatment can be measured directly through the presence of treatment facilities. We find that placing an...

Relative to typical eBay auctions, bidding in eBay charity auctions occurs earlier and also less frequently in the auctions' final seconds. This suggests that some charity bidders benefit from driving-up others' payments, as when auction revenue is a public good.

The danger of alcohol- and drug-impaired driving implies that policies that reduce substance abuse can save lives. Using several estimation approaches, we show that a US county’s supply of substance abuse treatment facilities is negatively and significantly related to the county’s number of...

This paper considers the optimal two-part pricing strategy of a monopolist whose customers collude when they purchase the firm's product. In contrast to the sentiment in the existing price discrimination literature, I find that a monopolist's profit can actually increase when consumers share its...

U.S. markets for outpatient substance abuse treatment (OSAT) include clinics that are private for-profit, private non-profit, and public (i.e., government-run). We study the market structure of OSAT using recently-developed methods from the empirical industrial organization literature on...

Consumers respond positively to products tied to charity, particularly from sellers that are relatively new and hence have limited alternative means of assuring quality. We establish this result using data from a diverse group of eBay sellers who "experiment" with charity by varying the presence...

We conduct a field experiment at a nonprofit organization's online store to study how demand changes when consumers' purchases can generate revenue for a charitable cause. When purchases can trigger a small donation by an outside anonymous group, consumers respond strongly and apparently without...