累进阶梯式水价下居民用水价格感知方式与选择分析  

Study on Price Perception and Choice of Residential Water Demand Under Increasing Block Tariffs of Residential Water

作　　者：马训舟[1] 张世秋[2] 

机构地区：[1]西南民族大学经济学院,四川成都610041 [2]北京大学环境科学与工程学院,北京100871

出　　处：《中国人口·资源与环境》2015年第11期128-135,共8页China Population,Resources and Environment

基　　金：西南民族大学应用经济学学位点建设项目(编号:2014XWD-S0202)

摘　　要：传统经济理论基于理性人的假设认为,在不考虑交易成本的情况下,理性消费者会依据商品的边际价格进行经济决策,即假设消费者可以敏锐地感知到边际价格及其变化。然而,本研究表明,由于"认知成本"和"习惯成本"的存在,在非线性价格结构下该假设有可能不再成立。在当前政府大力推动民生物品进行非线性的累进阶梯式价格改革的背景下,本研究以居民累进阶梯式水价为例,识别该价格结构下居民对价格的感知方式与行为选择。分析结果表明,收入最低的前两个群组对价格变化并不敏感,表明其用水消费具有刚性。对于第三至第五收入群组,感知价格类别介于平均和边际价格之间。进一步估算得到这三个收入群组的认知与习惯成本的最小值分别为5.6,5.2和4.3元/户·月。仅第六群组其感知价格为边际价格,以及价格变化并不能有效调节收入最高群组的用水行为。此外,如果居民对边际价格反应,则可能发生离散选择行为。本研究识别出第一阶梯用水支出占总用水支出的比例,阶梯价格差占第一阶梯价格水平等都是激励离散选择的显著影响因素。综上两方面的行为分析结果,由于大多数群组并没有依据边际价格决策,因此,力图通过不同阶梯间的价格差调整居民用水行为的价格政策作用将可能非常有限。同时,结合离散选择行为的估计系数,对比当前国内所实施的阶梯式水价,发现阶梯间的价格差普遍设计过小,有可能导致即使居民对边际价格感知,也无法激励跨阶梯的节水行为。这些分析结论有助于提示政策制定者须审慎进行累进阶梯式价格政策的改革与设计。Economic theory generally assumes that consumers respond to marginal price without transaction cost, which is the price of the last unit of goods consumed, when making economic decisions. However, this assumption may not hold for goods with multi-block rate schedules because of the cognitive and habitual costs. Currently, in light of the background that increasing block tariffs are vigorously implemented in residential livelihood industries such as residential water and electricity, our study explores the effects of water price information on residents＇ perception price and choice under increasing block tariffs based on the experimental design. The results show residents of the two lowest income groups are not sensitive to price change because of the lower income budgets. The mlddle-income groups from third to fifth respond to the price neither marginal nor average price and the perceived price level is between marginal nor average price. Then, we estimate the minimum value of cognitive and habitual costs for these three income groups are 5.6, 5.2 and 4.3 RMB per household monthly. We find only the sixth income group responds to marginal price, and for the richest income group, the price change is not capable of adjusting their water consumption. Moreover, if marginal price perception exists, rational consumers would probably make discrete choice. We find the several determinant that impact the probability of ＇ discrete choice＇ such as percentage of payments in first block consumption to the total water consumption payment, the percentage of price differentiation to the price of the first block. To sum up, major of income groups do not respond to marginal price and hence, the increasing block tariff policy that inspires water conservation by price differentiation between blocks may not be well expected. Meanwhile, according to the results from analysis of ＇ discrete choice＇ , we argue the price differentiations of increasing block tariffs implemented in China generally are under-sized and it may not ind

关 键 词：累进阶梯式水价 价格感知 认知成本与习惯成本 离散选择 收入群组 

分 类 号：F016[经济管理—政治经济学]