Environmental Degradation and the Limits to LOV

We show how consumers’ environmental concerns may limit ‘love of variety’ (LOV) and be reflected in consumers decisions. We investigate how the impact of environmental degradation on LOV influences demand and optimal product variety, and how a pollution tax on firms might be used to improve upon the market outcome and increase welfare.

The rise and fall of piecework–timework wage differentials: market volatility, labor heterogeneity, and output pricing

Based on detailed payroll data of blue collar male and female labor in Britain’s engineering and metal working industrial sectors between the mid-1920s and mid-1960s, we provide empirical evidence in respect of several central themes in the piecework-timework wage literature. The period covers part of the heyday of pieceworking as well as the start of its post-war decline. We show the importance of relative piece rate flexibility during the Great Depression as well as during the build up to WWII and during the war itself. We account for the very significant decline in the differentials after the war. Labor market topics include piecework pay in respect of compensating differentials, labor heterogeneity, and the transaction costs of pricing piecework output.