The Demand for Local Telephone Service: A Fully Discrete Model of Residential Calling Patterns and Service Choices
用嵌套logit模型分析家庭对本地电话服务选项（如包月制与计次制）的选择，以及这些选择如何影响通话次数和时长，发现服务选项间替代性高，提高计次费用对收入影响甚微。
We present an empirical model of households' choices among local telephone service options (for example, between flat-rate and measured service) and the interrelation of these choices with the number and average duration of local calls households make at each time of day to each geographical zone. Using a nested logit model with estimation performed on a randomly selected subset of the households' calling patterns, we calculate elasticities of demand for each local service option, number of calls, average duration, and revenues with respect to the fixed monthly charges and the usage charges for calling under each option. We find moderate price elasticities of number of calls with respect to usage charges for households subscribing to measured service. Nevertheless, raising usage charges has a negligible effect on revenues, since a sufficient number of households either originally subscribe to flat-rate service or convert to flat-rate service in response to higher usage charges. We find a high elasticity of demandfor each service option with respect to itsfixed monthlyfee. This indicates high substitutability among service options. The shift among service options induces new calling patterns, which wefind to be a small but not negligible indirect effect. E Most telephone operating companies offer residential customers several options for local service. There are two general categories of service: flat-rate service, under which a household can, for a fixed monthly charge, make an unlimited number of calls within a specified geographical area, and measured service, for which the household pays a lower fixed monthly fee but can make only a specified number (or dollar value) of calls at no extra charge, after which charges are incurred for additional calls. Various flat-rate services differ in the size of the geographical area in which calling is at no extra charge, with higher monthly fees for larger areas. Measured services differ with respect to the threshold number (or dollar value) of calls beyond which the customer is charged.