We develop a behavioral model of durable good usage with mental accounting for sunk costs. It predicts higher-than-rational usage that attenuates at a rate that increases with sunk costs. Singapore government policy varied the sunk cost of buying a new car. Using Singapore data, we estimate the...

Does the sunk cost fallacy affect decision-makers in high-stakes situations? We develop a behavioral model of usage of a durable good with mental accounting for sunk costs. It predicts that usage increases in the sunk cost, and attenuates with time at a rate that increases in the sunk cost. The...