The Causal Effect of Income on Market Social Responsibility
通过实验室和在线市场实验，研究消费者收入增加如何影响其购买社会责任产品的行为，发现高收入会提高社会责任产品的购买量，但总消费增加可能加剧负外部性。
Abstract We investigate the relationship between consumers’ incomes and socially responsible consumption that mitigates negative externalities. We conduct laboratory and online market experiments in which firms and consumers can exchange products that differ in the degree to which they diminish negative external impacts at the expense of higher production costs. Our treatments exogenously vary consumers’ incomes. Across all three experiments, higher income causes an increase in the quantity of socially responsible products purchased and at least slightly increases the share of such products as part of total consumption. However, increases in total consumption resulting from higher income can increase negative externalities.