Estimating cross-brand promotional effects with aggregate data requires knowledge of the joint distribution of each brand's promotions. While such information is available in store-level scanner data, it is not included in more aggregated scanner datasets. This book presents a technique for overcoming this difficulty and develops a retailer-level model that incorporates both own- and cross-brand promotions. Promotional activity is integrated into the specification in a manner consistent with the way store-level models control for promotions, thereby avoiding the problem of aggregation bias....

Across many forms of rent seeking contests, the impact of risk aversion on equilibrium play is indeterminate. We design an experiment to compare individuals' decisions across three contests which are isomorphic under risk-neutrality, but are typically not isomorphic under other risk preferences. The pattern of individual play across our contests is not consistent with a Bayes-Nash equilibrium for any distribution of risk preferences. We show that replacing the Bayes-Nash equilibrium concept with the quintal response equilibrium, along with heterogeneous risk preferences can produce...

This book investigates the effects of the Commonwealth of Virginia's ban on direct wine shipments from out-of-state sellers on wine prices and variety available to consumers in the greater McLean, Virginia area. Our results indicate that Virginia's direct shipment ban reduces the varieties of wine available to consumers and prevents consumers from purchasing some premium wines at lower prices online. Using a sample of 83 wines judged to be "highly popular" in Wine and Spirits magazine's annual restaurant poll, we find that 15 percent of wines available online were not available from retail...