Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP16954
Authors: Pierre Dubois; Rachel Griffith; Martin O'Connell
Abstract: The adoption of barcode scanning technology in the 1970's gave rise to a new form of data; scanner data. Soon afterwards researchers began using this new resource, and since then a large number of papers have exploited scanner data. The data provide detailed price, quantity and product characteristic information for completely disaggregate products at high frequency and typically either track a panel of stores and/or consumers. Their availability has led to advances, inter alia, in the study of consumer demand, the measurement of market power, firms' strategic interactions and decision-making, the evaluation of policy reforms, and the measurement of price dispersion and inflation. In this article we highlight some of the pro and cons of this data source, and discuss some of the ways its availability to researchers has transformed the economics literature.
Keywords: scanner data; demand estimation; market power; policy; counterfactual; inflation
JEL Codes: C80; D12; D22; E31; L10
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| scanner data (C87) | consumer behavior (D19) |
| scanner data (C87) | market power (L11) |
| scanner data (C87) | inflation measurement (E31) |
| scanner data (C87) | consumer demand models (D12) |
| scanner data (C87) | firm behavior (D21) |
| scanner data (C87) | market dynamics (D49) |