Cellular Telephone, New Products and the CPI
Cellular Telephone, New Products and the CPI
复制标题
蜂窝电话、新产品和 CPI
DOI：
10.1080/07350015.1999.10524809
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发表时间：
1997
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
J. Hausman
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
J. Hausman
移动电话是一个新产品的例子，它极大地影响了美国人的生活方式。自1983年引入以来，蜂窝电话的采用以每年25-35%的速度增长，使得在1996年底，在美国使用的蜂窝电话约为4200万部。然而，蜂窝电话尚未包括在CPI的结构中，并且CPI直到1998或1999年才包括蜂窝电话。这种对新商品的忽视导致了CPI的上涨倾向。该文件的分析表明，消费者福利的收益从一个新的产品，如移动电话可以是巨大的。本文还给出了一个近似的结果，劳工统计局可以用来计算新产品的消费者福利的收益，用于CPI。BLS电信CPI估计，自1988年以来，电信价格上涨了8.5%，即每年上涨1.02%。该估计忽略了蜂窝服务。包括移动电话服务在内的电信服务COLI从1988年的1.0下降到1996年的0.903，每年下降1.28%。因此，劳工统计局电信服务CPI的偏差约为每年2.3个百分点。在CPI中忽视新产品可能会导致严重的偏差。
Cellular telephone is an example of a new product that has significantly affected how Americans live. Since their introduction in 1983, cellular telephone adoption has grown at 25-35% per year such that at year end 1996 about 42 million cellular telephones are in use in the U.S. However, cellular telephone has not been included in the construction of the CPI, and the CPI will not include cellular telephone until 1998 or 1999. This neglect of new goods leads to an upward bias in the CPI. The analysis of the paper demonstrates that the gains in consumer welfare from a new product such as cellular telephone can be substantial. The paper also gives an approximation result which the BLS could use to calculate gains in consumer welfare from new products for use in the CPI. The BLS telecommunications CPI estimates that since 1988, telecommunications prices have increased by 8.5% or an increase of 1.02% per year. This estimate ignores cellular service. A corrected telecommunication services COLI that includes cellular service decreased from 1.0 in 1988 to 0.903 in 1996 for a decrease of 1.28% per year. Thus, the bias in the BLS telecommunications services CPI equals approximately 2.3 percentage points per year. The neglect of new products in the CPI can lead to significant biases.