2017年11月17日 星期五

Why Surge Prices Make Us So Mad諾貝爾經濟學得主:不該強推一套會引起道德義憤的規則


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2017/11/24 第193期 訂閱/退訂看歷史報份
 
 
紐時周報精選 Why Surge Prices Make Us So Mad諾貝爾經濟學得主:不該強推一套會引起道德義憤的規則
The Silent Film Returns - on Social Media能在最公開的地方私下觀賞 無聲影片打進社群媒體
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Why Surge Prices Make Us So Mad諾貝爾經濟學得主:不該強推一套會引起道德義憤的規則
文/Neil Irwin
譯/陳韋廷

When Bruce Springsteen decided to do a run of shows at a Broadway theater with fewer than a thousand seats, he appeared to reject the laws of economics — or at least what would seem to be in his financial best interest.

He limited ticket prices to $75 to $850 and has been allocating them through a lottery that includes identity verification. His goal was to prevent scalping. Yet not everyone who sought tickets got them at those prices. The tickets that have leaked onto the open market on StubHub ranged in one recent search from $1,200 to $9,999.

當布魯斯·史普林斯汀決定在一間不到1000個座位的百老匯劇院推出一檔表演時,他似乎揚棄了經濟學的定律,或至少看來最符合自身財務利益的定律。

他將票價限制在75到850美元之間,並透過必須驗證身份的抽籤來配售門票。他的目的是杜絕黃牛票,但並非每個想要買票的人都能以上述價格購得。外洩到StubHub公開市場的門票,最近某次搜索所顯示的票價範圍介於1200美元到9999美元之間。

It sure looks as if Springsteen left a great deal of money on the table and impeded the laws of the marketplace. After all, some people got tickets for $75 for which others were willing to pay four figures.

But the strategy may be less irrational than the raw numbers suggest. And understanding the hidden logic behind concert pricing — or how the Home Depot responds to a hurricane, or even how your neighborhood restaurant handles the Valentine's Day crunch — can provide a guide to solving some of society's biggest problems while satisfying people's deep need for a sense of fairness.

看來史普林斯汀的確少賺了很多錢並且妨礙了市場法則,別忘了,有些人拿到的是其他人願意付四位數購買的75美元門票。

然而,這個策略可能不像原始數據所顯示的那般不合理。了解演唱會門票定價的背後邏輯,或者家得寶如何應對颶風,或是鄰近餐廳如何處理情人節危機,皆可提供指引,讓我們在滿足人們對於公平的深層需求之際解決社會上一些最嚴重的問題。

Understanding this logic can also win you a Nobel. At least, it did recently for the University of Chicago economist Richard H. Thaler, who was honored for work that includes study of what constitutes fairness in markets. He has shown that the simplistic Economics 101 version of how markets work — in which a seller raises prices however much it takes to match demand — can be inefficient, or offend people's moral sensibilities, or both.

Technology is making "variable" or "dynamic" pricing — the same strategies that ensure airplane seats, hotel rooms or Uber cars are almost always available if you're willing to pay the price — more plausible in areas with huge social consequences.

而懂得這個邏輯也可讓你贏得諾貝爾經濟學獎,至少芝加哥大學經濟學家塞勒不久前就做到了,他的得獎成就包括對市場公平性的研究。他已指出,經濟學101基本版市場運作方式,亦即賣方會把價格提高至需求面可接受的最高程度這過分簡單化的觀點,可能效率不高或冒犯人們的道德感,抑或兩者兼有。

科技正在能產生巨大社會影響的領域內,讓「變動的」或是「動態的」定價變得更為可行,而這跟你若願意付那個價格,飛機座位、旅館房間或Uber汽車服務讓你幾乎都能取得的策略相同。

Dynamic pricing of electricity could help bring down pollution, reduce energy costs and make renewable energy more viable. Constantly adjusting prices for access to highways and congested downtowns could make traffic jams, with all the resulting wasted time and excess emissions, a thing of the past. Any sector where supplies tend to be fixed but demand fluctuates — the water supply, health care — would seem like prime candidates for variable pricing.

But technologists, entrepreneurs and regulators who would go down this path first need to learn a few lessons from Thaler — and Springsteen.

"A good rule of thumb is we shouldn't impose a set of rules that will create moral outrage, even if that moral outrage seems stupid to economists," Thaler said.

電費的動態定價有助於減少汙染、降低能源成本且讓再生能源更加可行。經常調整進入高速公路和擁擠市中心的價格,則可讓交通堵塞與因而產生的所有時間浪費與過度排放成為過去。供應趨於固定但需求波動的任何部門,諸如供水與醫療保健,似乎都很容易實施變動定價。

但想要走上變動定價這條路的技術專家、企業家與監管單位,則先得從塞勒,還有史普林斯汀那兒先學到一些教訓。

塞勒說:「一個很好的經驗法則是,我們不應該強推一套會引起道德義憤的規則,即便對經濟學家來說那種道德義憤顯得愚蠢。」

說文解字看新聞

文/陳韋廷

塞勒享有「行為經濟學之父」美譽,他在該領域的研究彌補了傳統經濟學供需理論的不足,對公平的理論與試驗研究也深具影響力,發現公平對市場價格漲價的影響,認為人們對公平的關注會厭惡企業在需求增加時漲價,而不會反對在成本上升時漲價。

變動定價也稱動態定價,指的是持續調整價格來配合個別顧客需要,屬定價方式(pricing method)一種,而dynamic反義詞則為static(靜態的),又文中俚語leave money on the table則是玩撲克牌時會使用的術語,意指本可獲取很多利益,但最終卻放棄了一部分。

此外,我們一般購物時常見到的建議售價英文則是 list price、recommended selling price或MSRP(Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price),而價格飆漲的英文會使用surge一字,價格暴跌則會用slump。

 
The Silent Film Returns - on Social Media能在最公開的地方私下觀賞 無聲影片打進社群媒體
文/Amanda Hess
譯/陳韋廷

The summer's hottest destination for video entertainment is a U.K.-based social media brand called LADbible. In July alone, the viral clips that churn out of its Facebook page were viewed more than 3 billion times.

Although the site is nominally branded around young British men, its offerings hold an oddly universal appeal. On a recent afternoon, it served up videos of a guy accidentally hitting himself in the head with a baseball bat; a pizza being made out of french fries; a dog bathing in a Jacuzzi; a woodworker crafting a salad bowl; a tourist riding a slide down the Great Wall of China and a manatee kissing a snorkeler.

今夏最受歡迎的影片娛樂目的網站,是總部設於英國的社群媒體品牌LADbible。光是7月,從它臉書頁面流出的網路爆紅短片瀏覽量就超過了30億次。

雖然該網站名義上是個英國年輕男性品牌,提供的內容卻有著奇特的普世吸引力。不久前的某個下午,該網站播放的影片包括:某人不小心用棒球棒打到了自己的頭,用薯條製作一塊披薩,一隻狗在按摩浴缸洗澡,一名木匠製作沙拉碗,一名遊客沿著中國長城滑下來,以及一隻海牛親吻一名浮潛者。

The videos are curated from disparate sources, filmed on smartphones and GoPros around the world, but they all have one thing in common: They're best watched silently. If they even have sound, it's completely beside the point.

We are living in the golden age of the silent video. Although we may still pop headphones in to watch a YouTube rant, social media has cultivated its own mute visual culture. Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are designed to encourage endless scrolling, and that boosts videos that are made to catch the viewer's eye without offending her ear with grating bursts of noise.

這些影片取自各種不同來源,以智慧手機跟GoPro攝影機在全球各地進行拍攝,但它們都有個共同點,就是最好默默地觀賞這些影片。若它們有聲音,就完全偏離了網站主題。

我們正活在靜音影片的黃金時代,即便我們可能還會戴著耳機在YouTube上觀看大聲播放的影片,社群媒體卻已發展出自己的無聲視覺文化。臉書、推特與Instagram在設計上就是要鼓勵無限滾動,而無限滾動助長了能吸引觀看者目光,卻不會讓刺耳聲音冒犯耳朵的影片。

The clips that spread the furthest online are the ones that can be consumed anywhere without disruption: on the subway, the sidewalk or in the doctor's office; next to a partner in bed, behind the counter at work or under the desk in class. They're the ones that allow for private experiences in the most public of places. And in the internet's global marketplace, they're the ones that transcend language barriers, instantly legible to viewers in Peoria or Paris.

Tubular Labs, the online video analytics company that placed LADbible at the top of its rankings, has found that of videos posted to Facebook by media companies, 46 percent of views go to videos that are completely silent or just accompanied by music. And in practice, an even higher proportion of social videos are watched silently. Advertising agency BBDO Worldwide says that more than 85 percent of its clients' Facebook videos are viewed with the sound off.

在網路上被傳播最多的短片,正是那些在任何地方都可不受干擾地享用的影片,例如地鐵上,人行道上,醫生辦公室裡,抑或是床伴旁邊,工作場所櫃台後面,或是教室課桌底下。它們是讓你能在最公開的地方私下體驗(觀賞)的東西。而在網路的全球市場中,它們是那些能超越語言障礙,讓你不論人在皮奧利亞或是巴黎都能立馬一目了然的東西。

將LADbible列為自家排行榜首位的網路影片分析公司Tubular Labs發現,各媒體公司張貼於臉書的影片,完全無聲或只伴隨音樂者占了46%的瀏覽量,且實際上,靜音觀賞社群影片的比率則又更高。廣告機構天聯表示,逾85%客戶在觀賞臉書影片時會關掉聲音。

All of that has given rise to a particular kind of video spectacle on social media, one that is able to convey its charms without dialogue, narrative or much additional context. To entertain soundlessly, viral video makers are reanimating some of the same techniques that ruled silent film more than 100 years ago.

以上種種使得社群媒體上出現一種特殊的影片現象,一種在沒有對話、敘述或許多額外背景情況下就能傳達其魅力的景象。網路爆紅影片製作者為了做出無聲娛樂,正重拾100多年前主宰默片的一些相同技術。

 
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