ORCID Profile
0000-0003-2133-0917
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Research Topics
In Research Link Australia (RLA), "Research Topics" refer to ANZSRC FOR and SEO codes. These topics are either sourced from ANZSRC FOR and SEO codes listed in researchers' related grants or generated by a large language model (LLM) based on their publications.
Top 5 Research Topics
ANZSRC Field of Research (FoR)
Applied Economics | Industry Economics and Industrial Organisation | Labour Economics | Environment and Resource Economics | Panel Data Analysis | Health Economics |
ANZSRC Socio-Economic Objective (SEO)
Industrial Organisations | Industry Policy | Residential Energy Conservation and Efficiency | Health Policy Economic Outcomes
Related Links
Publications
Recent Trends in Communications Equipment Prices
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 09-2015
Abstract: In a recently published working paper, Prices for Communications Equipment: Rewriting the Record, the authors of this note provide new estimates of prices for communications equipment for the period 1963 to 2009. In this note we extend those results through 2014 and comment briefly on the implications for high-tech innovation, production, and investment.
Is the Information Technology Revolution Over?
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 03-2013
Abstract: Given the slowdown in labor productivity growth in the mid-2000s, some have argued that the boost to labor productivity from IT may have run its course. This paper contributes three types of evidence to this debate. First, we show that since 2004, IT has continued to make a significant contribution to labor productivity growth in the United States, though it is no longer providing the boost it did during the productivity resurgence from 1995 to 2004. Second, we present evidence that semiconductor technology, a key ingredient of the IT revolution, has continued to advance at a rapid pace and that the BLS price index for microprocesssors may have substantially understated the rate of decline in prices in recent years. Finally, we develop projections of growth in trend labor productivity in the nonfarm business sector. The baseline projection of about 1 3/4 percent a year is better than recent history but is still below the long-run average of 2 1/4 percent. However, we see a reasonable prospect -- particularly given the ongoing advance in semiconductors -- that the pace of labor productivity growth could rise back up to or exceed the long-run average. While the evidence is far from conclusive, we judge that & #x27 No, the IT revolution is not over.& #x27
Start-up Search Costs
Publisher: American Economic Association
Date: 05-2022
DOI: 10.1257/MIC.20190279
Abstract: Workhorse economic models used for studying the market impacts of search frictions assume constant search costs: in iduals pay the same cost to obtain price information each time they search. This paper provides evidence on a new form of search costs: start-up costs. Exploiting a natural experiment in retail gasoline, we document how a temporary, large exogenous shock to consumers’ search incentives leads to a substantial, permanent increase in price search. A standard search model fails to explain such history dependence in search, while it follows directly from a model with a one-time up-front cost to start searching. (JEL D83, L13, L81)
Instrument-free identification and estimation of differentiated products models using cost data
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 06-2022
Australia Has the World's Best Petrol Price Data: FuelWatch and FuelCheck
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 28-11-2018
Tell Me Something I Don't Already Know: Informedness and the Impact of Information Programs
Publisher: MIT Press - Journals
Date: 07-2017
DOI: 10.1162/REST_A_00695
Does the United States have a Productivity Slowdown or a Measurement Problem
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 03-2016
Abstract: After 2004, measured growth in labor productivity and total-factor productivity (TFP) slowed. We find little evidence that the slowdown arises from growing mismeasurement of the gains from innovation in IT-related goods and services. First, mismeasurement of IT hardware is significant prior to the slowdown. Because the domestic production of these products has fallen, the quantitative effect on productivity was larger in the 1995-2004 period than since, despite mismeasurement worsening for some types of IT--so our adjustments make the slowdown in labor productivity worse. The effect on TFP is more muted. Second, many of the tremendous consumer benefits from smartphones, Google searches, and Facebook are, conceptually, non-market: Consumers are more productive in using their nonmarket time to produce services they value. These benefits do not mean that market-sector production functions are shifting out more rapidly than measured, even if consumer welfare is rising. Still, gains in non-market production appear too small to compensate for the loss in overall wellbeing from slower market-sector productivity growth. Third, other measurement issues we can quantify (such as increasing globalization and fracking) are also quantitatively small relative to the slowdown. Finally, we suggest high-priority areas for future research.
The Recent Slowdown in High-Tech Equipment Price Declines and Some Implications for Business Investment and Labor Productivity
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 03-2015
Abstract: Investment in high-tech equipment spurred by rapidly falling prices has accounted for an important share of business investment and labor productivity growth since the 1970s.
Consumer Search in Retail Gasoline Markets
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 03-2017
DOI: 10.1111/JOIE.12119
An Experimental Study of Monthly Electricity Demand (In)elasticity
Publisher: International Association for Energy Economics (IAEE)
Date: 04-2021
Petrol Price Cycles
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 23-11-2012
Price effects of calling out market power: A study of the COVID‐19 oil price shock
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 19-05-2022
DOI: 10.1111/JEMS.12485
Abstract: Governments often make public announcements that call into question firms' misuse of market power. Yet little is known about how firms respond to them. We study gasoline retailers' price responses to antitrust announcements shaming them for price gouging during the COVID‐19 pandemic. We identify price effects using a high‐frequency event‐study leveraging unique real‐time station‐level price data and well‐identified, discrete antitrust announcements. We find evidence of announcement effects that depend on firms' preannouncement margins and hence exposure to being publicly shamed. Public statements by antitrust questioning firms' misuse of market power can indeed contain signals that affect equilibrium outcomes.
How Fast are Semiconductor Prices Falling?
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 2017
Abstract: The Producer Price Index (PPI) for the United States suggests that semiconductor prices have barely been falling in recent years, a dramatic contrast to the rapid declines reported from the mid-1980s to the early 2000s. This slowdown in the rate of decline is puzzling in light of evidence that the performance of microprocessor units (MPUs) has continued to improve at a rapid pace. Over the course of the 2000s, the MPU prices posted by Intel, the dominant producer of MPUs, became much stickier over the chips' life cycle. As a result of this change, we argue that the matched-model methodology used in the PPI for MPUs likely started to be biased after the early 2000s and that hedonic indexes can provide a more accurate measure of price change since then. MPU prices fell rapidly through 2004 on every price measure we present, with the PPI declining at an even quicker pace than the hedonic indexes. However, from 2004 to 2009, our preferred hedonic index fell faster than the PPI, and from 2009 to 2013 the gap widened further, with our preferred index falling at an average annual rate of 42 percent, while the PPI declined at only a 6 percent rate. Given that MPUs currently represent about half of U.S. shipments of semiconductors, this difference has important implications for gauging the rate of innovation in the semiconductor sector.
Fuelling Australia: Structural Changes and New Policy Challenges in the Petrol Industry
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 12-2014
Canadian city housing prices and urban market segmentation
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 06-07-2009
Getting Smart About Phones: New Price Indexes and the Allocation of Spending Between Devices and Services Plans in Personal Consumption Expenditures
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 02-2019
Abstract: This paper addresses two measurement issues for mobile phones. First, we develop a new mobile phone price index using hedonic quality-adjusted prices for smartphones and a matched-model index for feature phones. Our index falls at an average annual rate of 17 percent during 2010-2018, close to the rate of decline in the price index used in the GDP Accounts. Given relatively flat average prices over this period, our index points to substantial quality improvement. Second, we propose a methodology to disentangle purchases of phones and wireless services when they are bundled together as part of a long-term service contract. Getting the allocation right is especially important for real PCE because the price deflators for phones and wireless services exhibit very different trends. Our adjusted estimates suggest that real PCE spending currently captured in the category Cellular Phone Services increased 4 percentage points faster than is reflected in published data.
Prices for Data Storage Equipment and the State of IT Innovation
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 07-2015
Abstract: This note presents new estimates of price trends for data storage equipment, a key general-purpose technology that enables both emerging and mature IT applications.
Price and Quality Dispersion in an Offshoring Market: Evidence from Semiconductor Production Services
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 12-2012
Abstract: We study cross-country differences in price and quality in the market for semiconductor wafer manufacturing services. Using a proprietary transaction-level data set, we document i) substantial constant-quality price differences across suppliers, and ii) shifts toward lower priced suppliers. Chinese producers on average charged 17% less than leading Taiwanese producers for otherwise identical products and increased their market share by 14.7 percentage points. The extent of cross-country price dispersion is also diminishing over a product& #x27 s life. A model with costs of switching suppliers is consistent with these pricing dynamics and can sustain realistic quality-adjusted price dispersion.
How do consumers respond to gasoline price cycles?
Publisher: International Association for Energy Economics (IAEE)
Date: 2015
Testing models of differentiated products markets: Consolidation in the cable tv industry
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 30-07-2015
DOI: 10.1111/IERE.12123
Domestic Electronics Manufacturing: Medical, Military, and Aerospace Equipment and What We Don't Know about High-Tech Productivity
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 06-2015
Abstract: Beginning in the 1990s, Federal Reserve Board staff paid increasing attention to electronics manufacturing in order to advance its understanding of technological innovation, of the role of the domestic industrial sector in global value chains, and of the sources of labor productivity growth.
Supplying Slot Machines to the Poor
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 23-10-2019
DOI: 10.1002/SOEJ.12407
Prices and Depreciation in the Market for Tablet Computers
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 12-2016
Abstract: Spurred by advances in electronic miniaturization and power efficiency, lightweight, powerful and inexpensive tablet computers entered the mass market in significant volumes in 2010. Since that time, sales of tablet computers have increased to account for over half of personal computer (PC) units sold worldwide.
Learning to Coordinate: A Study in Retail Gasoline
Publisher: American Economic Association
Date: 02-2019
DOI: 10.1257/AER.20170116
Abstract: This paper studies equilibrium selection in the retail gasoline industry. We exploit a unique dataset that contains the universe of station-level prices for an urban market for 15 years, and that encompasses a coordinated equilibrium transition mid-s le. We uncover a gradual, three-year equilibrium transition, whereby dominant firms use price leadership and price experiments to create focal points that coordinate market prices, soften price competition, and enhance retail margins. Our results inform the theory of collusion, with particular relevance to the initiation of collusion and equilibrium selection. We also highlight new insights into merger policy and collusion detection strategies. (JEL G34, L12, L13, L71, L81, Q35)
Prices for Communications Equipment: Rewriting the Record
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 09-2015
Abstract: Communication equipment plays as large a role in high-tech investment as computers, yet prices for communication equipment have not been studied as extensively as prices for computers and electronic components. Prices for satellites, cell phones, and the ground stations for these systems—important components of a nation’s communications infrastructure—are difficult to locate in official statistics. This paper develops new price measures for 14 types of communications equipment from 1963 to 2009. Indexes for some (e.g., cellular phone systems) experience declines of 15-20 percent per year, similar to the decline in quality-adjusted prices for computers, and suggest that advances in wireless communications technology have been very rapid. All told, our price index for domestic production falls 4.8 percent per year on average over the time period we study and 9.8 percent per year on average since 1985—nearly 10 percentage points faster than the official U.S. producer price index introduced in that year.
Price Discrimination by Negotiation: a Field Experiment in Retail Electricity
Publisher: Oxford University Press (OUP)
Date: 19-04-2022
DOI: 10.1093/QJE/QJAC021
Abstract: We use a field experiment to study price discrimination in a market with price posting and negotiation. Motivated by concerns that low-income consumers do poorly in markets with privately negotiated prices, we built a call center staffed with actors armed with bargaining scripts to reveal negotiated prices and their determinants. Our actors implement sequential bargaining games under incomplete information in the field. By experimentally manipulating how information is revealed, we generate sequences of price offers that allow us to identify price discrimination in negotiations based on retailer perceptions of consumers’ search and switching costs. We also document differences in price distributions between entrants and incumbents, reflecting differences in captivity of their respective consumer bases. Finally, we show that higher prices paid by lower-income subsidy recipients in our market is not due to discriminatory targeting they can be explained by variation in consumer willingness and ability to search and bargain.
ICT Asset Prices: Marshaling Evidence into New Measures
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 02-2017
Abstract: This paper is a companion to our recent paper, & quot ICT Prices and ICT Services: What do they tell us about Productivity and Technology?& quot It provides the sources and methods used to construct national accounts-style price deflators for the major components of ICT investment--communications equipment, computer equipment, and software--that were presented and analyzed in that paper. The ICT equipment measures described herein were also used in Byrne, Fernald, and Reinsdorf (2016).
Own-Account IT Equipment Investment
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 10-2017
Abstract: This note considers a puzzle: why has information technology (IT) equipment investment in the National income and Product Accounts (NIPAs) been so weak since 2007 at the same time that financial reports indicate massive increases in capital expenditures by IT service companies?
Gasoline Pricing in the Country and the City
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 18-09-2019
Consumer search and income inequality
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 12-2021
ICT Prices and ICT Services: What do they tell us about Productivity and Technology?
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 02-2017
Abstract: This paper reassesses the link between ICT prices, technology, and productivity. To understand how the ICT sector could come to the rescue of a whole economy, we introduce a simple model that sets out the steady-state contribution of the sector to the growth in U.S. labor productivity. The model extends Oulton (2012) to include ICT services (e.g., cloud computing) which has implications for the relationship between prices for ICT services and prices for the capital stocks (i.e., ICT assets) used to supply them. ICT asset prices are then put under a microscope, and official prices are found to substantially understate ICT price declines. And because ICT use continues to diffuse through the economy increasingly via cloud and related services which are not fully accounted for in the standard narrative on ICT& #x27 s contribution to economic growth the contribution of ICT to growth in output per hour going forward is calibrated to be substantially larger than thought in the past.
ICT Services and their Prices: What do they tell us about Productivity and Technology?
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 10-2017
Abstract: This paper reassesses the link between ICT prices, technology, and productivity. To understand how the ICT sector could come to the rescue of a whole economy, we extend a multi-sector model due to Oulton (2012) to include ICT services (e.g., cloud services) and use it to calibrate the steady-state contribution of the ICT sector to growth in aggregate U.S. labor productivity. Because ICT technologies diffuse through the economy increasingly via purchases of cloud and data analytic services that are not fully accounted for in the standard narrative on ICT& #x27 s contribution to economic growth, the contribution of ICT to growth in output per hour going forward is found to be substantially larger than generally thought--1.4 percentage points per year. One reason why the estimated contribution is so large is that official ICT asset prices are found to substantially understate the productivity of the sector. The model developed in this paper also has implications for the relationship between prices for ICT services and prices for the capital stocks (i.e., ICT assets) used to supply them. In particular, ICT service prices may erge from asset prices and capture productivity gains from ICT asset management by the sector.
ICT Asset Prices: Marshaling Evidence into New Measures
Publisher: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Date: 10-2017
Abstract: This paper is a companion to our recent paper, & quot ICT Prices and ICT Services: What do they tell us about Productivity and Technology?& quot It provides the sources and methods used to construct national accounts-style price deflators for the major components of ICT investment--communications equipment, computer equipment, and software--that were presented and analyzed in that paper. The ICT equipment measures described herein were also used in Byrne, Fernald, and Reinsdorf (2016). This paper is a companion to our recent paper, & quot ICT Services and their Prices: What do they tell us about Productivity and Technology?& quot It provides the sources and methods used to construct national accounts-style price deflators for the major components of ICT investment--communications equipment, computer equipment, and software--that were analyzed and used in that paper. The ICT equipment measures described herein were also used in Byrne, Fernald, and Reinsdorf (2016).
Related Organisations
Related Funding Activities
Technology Transforming Markets: Large-scale Field Experiments In Electricity Use
Start Date: 2014
End Date: 2017
Funder: Australian Research Council
View Funded ActivityPrice Transparency, Search, And Collusion In Markets
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End Date: 2024
Funder: Australian Research Council
View Funded ActivityCompetition In Medical Labour Markets
Start Date: 2015
End Date: 2018
Funder: Australian Research Council
View Funded ActivityLinkage Projects - Grant ID: LP140100099
Start Date: 07-2014
End Date: 06-2018
Amount: $177,000.00
Funder: Australian Research Council
View Funded ActivityDiscovery Projects - Grant ID: DP210102321
Start Date: 05-2021
End Date: 05-2025
Amount: $311,801.00
Funder: Australian Research Council
View Funded ActivityDiscovery Projects - Grant ID: DP150100357
Start Date: 06-2015
End Date: 12-2019
Amount: $387,100.00
Funder: Australian Research Council
View Funded Activity