Dave Dhaval, Saffer Henry
Bentley College & National Bureau of Economic Research, Department of Economics, 175 Forest Street, AAC 195 Waltham, MA 02452-4705, United States.
J Econ Psychol. 2008 Dec;29(6):810-831. doi: 10.1016/j.joep.2008.03.006.
Both economists and psychologists have studied the concept of risk preference. Economists categorize individuals as more or less risk-tolerant based on the marginal utility of income. Psychologists categorize individuals' propensity towards risk based on harm avoidance, novelty seeking and reward dependence traits. The two concepts of risk are related, although the instruments used for empirical measurement are quite different. Psychologists have found risk preference to be an important determinant of alcohol consumption; however economists have not included risk preference in studies of alcohol demand. This is the first study to examine the effect of risk preference on alcohol consumption in the context of a demand function. The specifications employ multiple waves from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), which permit the estimation of age-specific models based on nationally representative samples. Both of these data sets include a unique and consistent survey instrument designed to directly measure risk preference in accordance with the economist's definition. This study estimates the direct impact of risk preference on alcohol demand and also explores how risk preference affects the price elasticity of demand. The empirical results indicate that risk preference has a significant negative effect on alcohol consumption, with the prevalence and consumption among risk-tolerant individuals being 6-8% higher. Furthermore, the tax elasticity is similar across both risk-averse and risk-tolerant individuals. This suggests that tax policies are as equally effective in deterring alcohol consumption among those who have a higher versus a lower propensity for alcohol use.
经济学家和心理学家都研究了风险偏好的概念。经济学家根据收入的边际效用将个人归类为或多或少具有风险承受能力。心理学家根据避免伤害、寻求新奇和奖励依赖特质对个人的风险倾向进行分类。尽管用于实证测量的工具截然不同，但这两种风险概念是相关的。心理学家发现风险偏好是酒精消费的一个重要决定因素；然而，经济学家在酒精需求研究中并未纳入风险偏好。这是第一项在需求函数背景下研究风险偏好对酒精消费影响的研究。这些模型使用了收入动态面板研究（PSID）和健康与退休研究（HRS）的多轮数据，这使得能够基于具有全国代表性的样本估计特定年龄的模型。这两个数据集都包含一个独特且一致的调查工具，旨在根据经济学家的定义直接测量风险偏好。本研究估计了风险偏好对酒精需求的直接影响，并探讨了风险偏好如何影响需求的价格弹性。实证结果表明，风险偏好对酒精消费有显著的负面影响，风险承受能力强的个体中的患病率和消费量要高6 - 8%。此外，厌恶风险和风险承受能力强的个体的税收弹性相似。这表明税收政策在抑制酒精使用倾向较高和较低的人群的酒精消费方面同样有效。
