1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910814229903321

Autore

Waldfogel Joel <1962->

Titolo

The tyranny of the market : why you can't always get what you want / / Joel Waldfogel

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cambridge, Mass., : Harvard University Press, 2007

ISBN

0-674-04479-7

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (217 p.)

Classificazione

MS 5560

Disciplina

381

Soggetti

Consumers' preferences

Majorities

Supply and demand

Social choice

Free enterprise

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. 189-193) and index.

Nota di contenuto

Theory -- Markets and the tyranny of the majority -- Are "lumpy" markets a problem? -- Empirical evidence -- Who benefits whom in practice -- Who benefits whom in the neighborhood -- Preference minorities as citizens and consumers -- Market solutions and their limits -- Market enlargement and consumer liberation -- Fixed costs, product quality, and market size -- Trade and the tyranny of alien majorities -- Salvation through new technologies -- Policy solutions and their limits -- Government subsidies and insufficient demand -- Books and liquor: two case studies.

Sommario/riassunto

Economists have long counseled reliance on markets rather than on government to decide a wide range of questions, in part because allocation through voting can give rise to a "tyranny of the majority." Markets, by contrast, are believed to make products available to suit any individual, regardless of what others want. But the argument is not generally correct. In markets, you can't always get what you want. This book explores why this is so and its consequences for consumers with atypical preferences.