• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
• /
• v.18 no.2
• /
• pp.173-190
• /
• 2009

Although renewable energy sources are more environmentally friendly than fossil energy sources, they are far more costly and hard to survive in the electricity market. For a competitive renewable electricity, the government should take 'visible' actions to compensate higher production costs. Popular policies, such as Feed-In-Tariff and Renewable Portfolio Standards, are financed by an undifferentiated increase of electricity bills (a collective financing mechanism) but are occasionally confronted with the opposition of the electricity consumers. This paper discusses the consumers' willingness to pay for renewable energy in order to back up the voluntary financing mechanism, the Green Pricing. The Tobit analysis of a consumer survey shows that the consumer's WTP is positively influenced by his environmentally friendly activities under both financing mechanisms. The knowledge on renewable energy is statistically significant only under collective financing mechanism.

• Journal of Distribution Science
• /
• v.14 no.10
• /
• pp.47-57
• /
• 2016

Purpose - This study's purpose is to investigate the market structure of the Korean duty free shop industry that has received recent attention from researchers and practitioners. By raising the question of whether or not the Korean duty free shop industry is unequivocally monopolistic, a wider viewpoint is provided. The study seeks to offer insights and managerial implications for marketers and policy makers who are in charge of regulating major Korean duty free shops. Research design, data, and methodology - The authors use secondary data from various sources, including Korea Customs Service and the Moodie Report, to investigate the structure of the duty free shop industry of Korea. Based on several theories, they present various criteria and statistical evidence such as K-firm concentration ratio, HHI, consumer substitutability, excess profit, and marketing costs. Results - In terms of consumer substitutability, it is difficult to confirm whether or not the Korean duty free shop industry is monopolistic. Notwithstanding monopoly characteristics in terms of market share, neither the company Lotte nor Shilla appear to have market dominating power. It is not easy for either of them to control prices or to achieve a much lower operational profit ratio due to a dominant bargaining power. Moreover, the license is not an economic rent. In this situation, it is not easy for these companies to obtain an excessive profit. Conclusions - Considering that most global duty free shops are trying to go upscale to improve bargaining power, it does not seem likely that rigid regulations are needed in the industry. Even though the Korean duty free industry ostensibly has a monopolistic structure, government and policy-makers should look beyond the surface. They should take global and other reasonable criteria into consideration when they establish or change regulation policies. Thorough understanding and appropriate support are needed for the Korean duty free shop industry. Additionally, duty free shops should position themselves as global companies struggling against unlimited international competition, rather than Korean domestic companies. At the same time, they need to give customers appropriate information about the benefits they provide.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
• /
• v.43 no.11
• /
• pp.957-965
• /
• 2010

The municipal water is directly related to the people's quality of life. To examine and implement reasonable water policies including management of the water demand and economically sound investment decisions, it is essential to estimate the conceptually correct and empirically valid economic value of water. This study attempts to estimate the consumer surplus and economic value of municipal water which is supplied to 16 cities in Korea using demand curve approach. The results indicate that the consumer surplus and economic value of municipal water in 2009 are estimated as KRW 1,180.7 per $m^3$ and KRW 1,812.8 per $m^3$, respectively. The economic values of municipal water in 16 cities range from KRW 1,082.7 per $m^3$ to KRW 3,268.6 per $m^3$. Moreover, the economic value of non-residential water is higher than that of residential water in all cities, and the economic value of water is higher than the present price of water. This study is expected to provide policy-makers with useful information to assess a policy and to evaluate the price of water.

• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
• /
• v.19 no.6
• /
• pp.1031-1044
• /
• 2010

Corresponding to the rapid growth of the aging population without an adequate social safety net for the elderly, older people face great disadvantages due to sudden illness or poor health and a lack of support from the younger generation. Furthermore, older women are suffering from a drastic deterioration of their economic status because of insufficient retirement savings. Examining the impact of labor force participation and living arrangement on health status and life satisfaction in later life, it is important to consider gender differences in context of social policies for the elderly. Using data based on a stratified national sample of the elderly by the Korean Longitudinal Study of Aging (KLoSA), multiple regression model were used to estimate the relationships between labor force participation and health status and subjective life satisfaction concerning the quality of their later life. The result indicates that good health status and high level of life satisfaction are associated with the type of paid work status for the elderly men, but those are associated with the type of non paid work, such as family businesses employees for the elderly women. Significant differences in chronic health condition and subjective life satisfaction by employment characteristics are found among the elderly. In addition, older women's high level of life satisfaction was associated with the participation of the social activity. The major conclusion from these results should help us understand gender differences in the elderly and acknowledge further exploration of gender variations in these people's later life.

• Journal of Korea Society of Digital Industry and Information Management
• /
• v.15 no.4
• /
• pp.173-187
• /
• 2019

Based on the theory of planning behavior, the purpose of this study was to validate the path to consumers organic bakery product purchasing process, and moderating effect of price sensitivity. The improvement of national income and changes in diet due to economic growth began to increase consumption of organic and eco-friendly farm products, and thus products using organic materials began to be released in bakeries. Thus, it was necessary to understand consumer awareness and purchasing processes for organic bakery products. Specifically, the study examined the structural relations among purchase reasons, purchase motives, and purchase behavioral intention of organic bakery products. A survey was conducted in May 2019 from adults who had experience purchasing organic bakery products in Seoul metropolitan area, and 327 responses were used for data analysis. The findings of the study showed that consumers' interests in health, food safety, and environment had positive effects on their attitudes, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control toward organic bakery products, while their interests in organic products did not have an effect on perceived behavioral control. There were significant differences in the purchasing process of organic bakery products according to their price sensitivity. The study suggests that the correct delivery of information on organic ingredients and the price policies available to many consumers will contribute to the revitalization of organic bakery products.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
• /
• v.40 no.1
• /
• pp.115-123
• /
• 2015

As LTE service and smartphone are emerging as the mainstream of mobile communications market, the value and importance of mobile data service has been further increased. MNO(mobile network operator)s already recognized the data service as essential market needs, and have appealed to consumers based on various satisfaction elements of data service such as faster transmission speed, expended data volume provided as default, and introduction of unlimited plan. So, in the smartphone market where has been mature, investigating what service attributes affect users' selection of data service is very meaningful from the perspectives of both the industry and the academic. Under this background, this study explores determinants influencing consumer's choice for mobile data service and analyzes relative importance of the attributes among different type of users. The findings of this study makes us extend our understanding of consumer characteristics and their service needs in data service centric era, and it provides some implications for establishing telecommunications policies and business strategies.

• Nutrition Research and Practice
• /
• v.9 no.5
• /
• pp.517-522
• /
• 2015

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: The objective of this study was to investigate food allergens and prevalence rates of food allergies, followed by comparison of consumer attitudes and preferences regarding food allergy labeling by diagnosis of food allergies. SUBJECTS/METHODS: A total of 543 individuals living in Seoul and Gyeonggi area participated in the survey from October 15 to 22 in 2013. RESULTS: The results show that the prevalence of doctor-diagnosed food allergies was 17.5%, whereas 6.4% of respondents self-reported food allergies. The most common allergens of doctor-diagnosed and self-reported food allergy respondents were peaches (30.3%) and eggs (33.3%), respectively, followed by peanuts, cow's milk, and crab. Regarding consumer attitudes toward food labeling, checking food allergens as an item was only significantly different between allergic and non-allergic respondents among all five items (P < 0.001). All respondents reported that all six items (bold font, font color, box frame, warning statement, front label, and addition of potential allergens) were necessary for an improved food allergen labeling system. PLSR analysis determined that the doctor-diagnosed group and checking of food allergens were positively correlated, whereas the non-allergy group was more concerned with checking product brands. CONCLUSIONS: An effective food labeling system is very important for health protection of allergic consumers. Additionally, government agencies must develop policies regarding prevalence of food allergies in Korea. Based on this information, the food industry and government agencies should provide clear and accurate food labeling practices for consumers.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
• /
• v.14 no.2
• /
• pp.181-190
• /
• 2019

The purpose of this study is to help the understanding of the housing market through the influence of consumer choice attributes and financial policy on home buyer behavior. The key issue in the analysis is to take into account moderate effect of housing investment demand between different types of housing attribute choice and financial policy. The results of the study are as follows. First, convenience, education location, and neighborhood level have a significant effect on the purchase intention of the housing. Second, government policy have no significant influence on the purchase intention of the house. Third, the moderating effects of real estate investment outlook are that the neighbors level and interaction variables have a statistically significant effect on the purchase intention of the house. Since the government's financial policies do not affect the decision to buy a house, in reality, excessive regulation may reduce the quality of housing welfare for the first time home buyers. As a result of this study, the financial policy of the government does not affect the decision of the purchase of the house. In reality, the excessive regulation may reduce the quality of the housing welfare for the first time home buyer. Only an analysis which combines these aspects of consumer's choice can adequately describe and explain the actual change in demand in the residential market.

• The Journal of the Institute of Internet, Broadcasting and Communication
• /
• v.22 no.6
• /
• pp.185-190
• /
• 2022

Open data has a lot of economic value. Not only Korea, but many other countries are doing their best to make various policies and efforts to expand and utilize open data. However, although Korea has a large amount of data, the data is not utilized effectively. Thus, attempts to utilize those data should be made in various industries. In particular, in the fashion industry, exchange and refund problems are the most common due to unpredictable consumers. Better feedback is necessary for service providers to solve this problem. We want to solve it by showing improved images of dissatisfactions along with user reviews including consumer needs. In this paper, user reviews are analyzed on online shopping mall websites to identify consumer needs, and product attributes are defined by utilizing the attributes of K-fashion data. The users' request is defined as a dissatisfaction attribute, and labeling data with the corresponding attribute is searched. The users' request is provided to the service provider in forms of text data or attributes, as well as an image to help improve the product.

• Journal of Korea Society of Industrial Information Systems
• /
• v.28 no.1
• /
• pp.35-48
• /
• 2023

In this study, we introduced the development status and the government policy of the Chinese automobile industry under the rapidly changing global economic environment. We conducted a consumer trend survey on automobile purchases by consumers in China. Despite the Chinese government's strong national emission control policy and stricter standards for manufacturing and selling internal combustion engine vehicles, 59.6% of respondents saying they would choose an internal combustion engine vehicle when purchasing a vehicle in the future for various reasons. It was confirmed that there is a significant gap between government policies and consumer perceptions. In addition, we have discovered the recent declining trend of automobile sales in China, and used the monthly sales volume from January 2010 to December 2020 as training set, and the sales volume from January 2021 to November 2022 as a test set. We proposed and evaluated a time-series model for predicting future automobile demand in China. Then, we showed the monthly sales forecast for 2023 when each model was applied.