Estimating Demand for Local Telephone Service with Asymmetric Information and Optional Calling Plans
研究消费者对未来消费不确定时，垄断者提供强制非线性资费或可选二部资费菜单的理论与计量含义，并用1986年肯塔基两城市的资费实验数据检验，发现消费者与垄断者之间存在显著信息不对称，且引入可选资费未能提升预期福利。
In this paper, I study the theoretical and econometric implications of agents' uncertainty concerning their future consumption when a monopolist offers them either a unique, mandatory nonlinear tariff or a choice in advance from a menu of optional two-part tariffs. Agents' uncertainty is resolved through individual and privately known shocks to their types. In such a situation the principal may screen agents according to their ex ante or ex post type, by offering either a menu of optional tariffs or a standard nonlinear schedule. The theoretical implications of the model are used to evaluate a tariff experiment run by South Central Bell in two cities in Kentucky in 1986. The empirical approach explicitly accounts for the existence of informational asymmetries between local telephone users and the monopolist, leading to different, nested, econometric specifications under symmetric and asymmetric information. The empirical evidence suggests that there exists a significant asymmetry of information between consumers and the monopolist under both tariff regimes. All expected welfare components failed to increase with the introduction of optional tariffs for the estimated value of the parameters. Copyright 2002, Wiley-Blackwell.