Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/278182 
Year of Publication: 
2022
Series/Report no.: 
WWZ Working Paper No. 2022/05
Publisher: 
University of Basel, Center of Business and Economics (WWZ), Basel
Abstract: 
Using data from a field experiment, we provide estimates for the own-price elasticity of train travel in Switzerland. Our estimates are based on exogenous changes to the level of discounts for long-distance trains and thus avoid the usual endogeneity problem between demand-dependent discounts. Besides the price, we also vary the length of the pre-sale period during the experiment, which allows us to recover the relative effectiveness of pricing and timing measures. We compute own-price elasticities of around -0.7. Extending the pre-sale deadline by one hour leads to an increase in the pre-sale of discount tickets by 2.1%, which is equivalent to a price decrease by 3.1%. Reducing the price by 10% causes customers to purchase the discount ticket 7 hours earlier. Our results help design measures for peak-shifting in transport at least societal cost.
Subjects: 
Field Experiments
Public Transport Systems
Train
Dynamic Pricing
Switzerland
JEL: 
L92
R41
L11
C93
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.