Holiday Gift-Giving – Deadweight Loss or Welfare Gain?

IF 0.6 Q3 Economics, Econometrics and Finance

Economics Bulletin Pub Date : 2020-01-01 DOI:10.2139/ssrn.3631150

Ze'ev Shtudiner

引用次数: 1

Abstract

For macro-economists, the importance of holiday gift-giving is the effect of spending on the macro economy. However, for micro-economists, gift-giving has a different important aspect. As purchasing choice is made by someone other than the recipient (i.e. the final consumer), economic theory therefore suggests cash may be superior to gifts in-kind that are welfare reducing (i.e. deadweight loss). That is, the cost of the gift is higher than its value to the recipient. However, there has been no consensus in the empirical literature on whether gift-giving creates or destroys value. In this study, we found that purchasing holiday gifts (for the Jewish Passover in Israel) leads to welfare gains. Although there is no difference in the price of gifts given to women compared to men, the value and welfare gain are lower for women. This result is also reflected in a higher rate of gift return and lower satisfaction among women compared to men. Social distance between the giver and the recipient did not affect the welfare gain.

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节日送礼——无谓损失还是福利收获?

对于宏观经济学家来说，节日送礼的重要性在于消费对宏观经济的影响。然而，对于微观经济学家来说，送礼有一个不同的重要方面。由于购买选择是由接受者以外的人(即最终消费者)做出的，因此经济学理论认为，现金可能优于减少福利(即无谓损失)的实物礼物。也就是说，礼物的成本高于它对接受者的价值。然而，关于送礼是创造价值还是破坏价值，在实证文献中并没有达成共识。在这项研究中，我们发现购买节日礼物(为以色列的犹太人逾越节)会带来福利收益。尽管女性收到的礼物价格与男性没有差别，但女性收到的礼物的价值和福利收益都较低。这一结果也反映在女性的礼物回收率比男性高，而满意度比男性低。赠予者和受赠者之间的社会距离对福利收益没有影响。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Economics Bulletin ECONOMICS-

CiteScore

1.60

自引率

0.00%

发文量

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