Title :
The Question of Ownership in a Sharing Economy
Author :
Weber, Thomas A.
Author_Institution :
Ecole Polytech. Fed. de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
Abstract :
The sharing of durable goods in a dynamic ownership economy is attractive, since it has the potential to realize gains from trade via short-term transfers of usage rights. We develop a model in which a set of agents, who are heterogeneous in their likely need of a durable good, make purchase decisions and then have the option to participate in a sharing market contingent on a realized need. The agents´ purchase decisions are compared to a situation where ex-post sharing is impossible. The impact of sharing on product sales is ambiguous: for low-price products sales may drop, while for high-price products the number of consumers who decide to become owners may actually increase. Our analysis extends to a sharing market in which prices are negotiated bilaterally in a Nash-bargaining framework. The resulting negotiated-sharing equilibrium allows for a realistic supply-demand imbalance in the sharing market.
Keywords :
decision making; economics; game theory; purchasing; supply and demand; Nash-bargaining framework; agent purchase decisions; durable goods sharing; dynamic ownership economy; high-price products; low-price product sales; negotiated-sharing equilibrium; purchase decision making; realistic supply-demand imbalance; sharing economy; sharing market; short-term usage right transfers; Abstracts; Collaboration; Context; Cost accounting; Economics; Internet; Peer-to-peer computing; collaborative consumption; insurance market; peer-to-peer exchange; sharing; willingness to accept; willingness to pay;
Conference_Titel :
System Sciences (HICSS), 2015 48th Hawaii International Conference on
Conference_Location :
Kauai, HI
DOI :
10.1109/HICSS.2015.578