Demand for and productivity analysis of Turkish public theater

We estimate a demand function for live theater provided by the General Directorate of State Theaters in Turkey. We show that demand is more elastic in less developed cities, that attendance is not significantly affected by various qualitative variables, and that the government's practice of offering free passes to government officials is an ineffective way of increasing paid attendance. Comedies and musicals both show significantly higher attendance. Having a Turkish author does not significantly affect attendance. Having a known author significantly increases attendance for more developed cities but not for less developed cities. Being the opening season significantly reduces attendance in less developed cities but has no effect in more developed cities. We also present evidence of inefficiency in state theaters in Turkey through a performance of plays equation in which we evaluate the determinants of the number of performances per play.     

Frequency of museum attendance: motivation matters

Some recent empirical contributions have highlighted that tourists often go to museums yet appear to extract little utility from the experience. We argue that this is often the case with agents who visit museums only while on holiday and results from a temporary lack of substitute experience goods or compliance with a must-do list. If such agents behaved according to Stigler and Becker’s rational addiction theory, they would also visit museums while at home. However, most do not, which makes them constantly occasional consumers. We indirectly test for the presence of constantly occasional museum attendance by tourists, using data from a survey conducted in 2012 at Vittoriale, the most popular museum at Lake Garda, a renowned Italian tourist destination. By applying multiple correspondence analysis to a question on motivations to visit the museum, we obtain two dimensions of motivation: one based on a search for knowledge and the other based on a more recreational attitude. Identification of the latter is a new finding in itself. We include these dimensions as regressors in a model used to explain museum attendance. We find, as expected, that light consumption negatively affects attendance. We therefore argue that empirical analyses of museum attendance should not disregard light motivation as a possible driver.     

Cinema Demand in Spain: A Cointegration Analysis

In this paper we explain the decline in cinema attendance in Spain since 1968. We use a cointegration analysis to estimate an individual demand function for cinema, with annual data and in terms of average attendance per inhabitant. We find that cinema is a luxury good and that its demand is elastic with respect to its price. We also show that television acts as a deterrent with regard to cinema attendance. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Do the arts make you happy? A quantile regression approach

Compared to other leisure time activities, the effect of arts attendance on happiness has received less attention and studies of related topics have produced mixed results, identifying either no effect or very small effects. We investigate this issue using a large (N = 7753) sample from the UK. In contrast to earlier studies, quantile regression is used to allow the relationship between arts attendance and other controls and happiness to vary across different levels of happiness. The relationship found in prior studies is confirmed, but the quantile regression results show that the nature of the relationship varies across the distribution of the happiness variable. A significant relationship is found at the lower quartile, and a moderate relationship (significant at the 10% level) is found at the median level.     

Competition among movie theaters: an empirical investigation of the Toho–Subaru antitrust case

This study assesses the 1951 Toho?CSubaru antitrust merger case in the Japanese movie theater market. Using information regarding the location of theaters in the Tokyo metropolitan area, I examined the relationship between the number of attendees and the structure of the local market competition: a regression equation relating to the number of attendees and the local market structure was derived from a model of product differentiation, which incorporated the features of a movie theater market. The results revealed that nearby rival theaters had negative effects on other theaters?? attendance numbers, and these effects did not dissipate even where there was 10?km between each theater. Based on empirical results, it appears that the Tokyo High Court and the competition agency defined the geographic movie theater market as being smaller than it actually was. The results of this study suggest that the application of econometric analysis, combining geographic information, is useful in merger reviews of retail industries, such as movie theaters.     

Tourism flows and the demand for regional and city theatres in Austria

This paper investigates the impact of tourism flows on demand for large regional and city theatres in Austria over the period from 1972 to 2011 (39 years). The results are obtained by applying an aggregated theatre demand function for both residents and tourists. The elasticity of theatre attendance in response to tourism is estimated along with other standard demand variables such as ticket price and income. The quality factors and theatre-specific effects are also included. The tourism flows variables are derived using detailed data set on tourist arrivals and their overnight counts, and they are also split between domestic and foreign tourists. To measure the impact of tourism flows on theatre demand, three alternative theatre markets specifications are considered. The total elasticity of attendance per capita in response to tourism is estimated between 15 and 20 %, indicating that increasing the number of arrivals by two tourists per resident in the relevant market would generate an increase in theatre attendance by 581–680 thousand visitors per year. The role of tourism flows is found to be particularly important for attendance at opera, operetta and musicals as opposed to attendance at drama performances. The analysis also reveals that foreign, non-German tourists have a positive impact on theatre attendance, whereas domestic tourists do not contribute significantly to higher demand for Austrian theatres.     

Performing arts attendance in Taiwan: who and how often?

This paper uses the logistic regression model and the count data model to identify the determinants of the likelihood and frequency of attendance at performing arts events in Taiwan. Using data collected from a telephone survey, we find that education and income, being determinants of the likelihood of attendance, are not significant in determining frequency of attendance. On the other hand, whereas members of performing arts groups attend more frequently than non-members, holding a membership or not does not seem to affect the likelihood of attendance. Personal relationships with the performing arts industry make one more likely to attend as well as to attend more frequently. Those who more often watch or listen to performing arts programs through the media or pay more attention to performing arts-related information are also likely to participate in live events and participate frequently. Lastly, age dose matter. We further find evidence of both life cycle and human capital effects in performing arts attendance.     

Rational addiction and cultural goods: the case of the Italian theatregoer

This paper tests whether demand for theatre in Italy is consistent with the model of rational addiction presented in Becker and Murphy (J Polit Econ 96(4):675–700, 1988). Data from a novel 34-year panel on regional annual theatre attendance are used to estimate market demand. Four models are applied to investigate the demand function, and all of these also include per capita income and other control variables as regressors. The first two models are estimated to check whether theatregoers are myopically addicted to theatre. The results suggest that the theatre is an addictive good because past consumption (and prices) significantly raises the marginal utility of current consumption. The third model tests the rational addiction hypothesis, which assumes that future attendance also influences current attendance, whilst past and future prices influence current attendance only indirectly through their impact on past and future attendances. However, our most highly specified model, introducing past and future prices, demonstrates that Italian theatregoers are not myopic but fully rational as outlined in Becker and Murphy (1988). The results demonstrate that the rational addiction hypothesis is applicable not only to “harmful” addictions such as alcohol, cigarettes and drug consumption, but also to “beneficial” addictions, such as theatre attendance. This result has important policy implications because theatre is one of the most subsidised performing arts in Italy; if theatregoers are fully rational, policy makers can influence theatre attendance using alternative policy instruments (price and income), thereby reducing government expenditure on theatre subsidies.     

Live and prerecorded popular music consumption

Changing consumption habits have rearranged the popular music market in the last decade, and a pattern in which live music attendance gets an increasing share of the market has emerged. This work analyzes the demand for the popular music sector considering its double dimension as supplier of live concerts and prerecorded music. We use the 2006/2007 wave of Spain’s Survey on Habits and Cultural Practices, and estimate a bivariate probit model for attendance to live concerts and the purchase of prerecorded music. Results allow us to describe the profile of the average and frequent consumer in both markets, which shows some similarities—gender effects and the role of cultural capital—but also striking differences—time restrictions and relation to economic activity, and the use of technology. Finally, we find evidence of demand complementarities, with a direct causal link from prerecorded music to live attendance that helps explain recent institutional changes.     

Programmatic choices and the demand for theatre: the case of Flemish theatres

Theatre experts generally agree that the Flemish theatre has flourished artistically over the period 1980–2000. Attendance, on the other hand, has declined significantly. Following Lancaster’s characteristics approach, we identify several output characteristics of individual theatre productions. Using a panel of 59 Flemish theatres, we examine the impact on demand of both these output characteristics and of traditional determinants such as own price, income and the price of substitutes. Differences in the relevant geographical market for touring and non-touring theatres are considered. We find that the nature of the artistic output affects demand. Theatregoers prefer large productions (in terms of cast size), plays by Dutch-speaking playwrights and revivals of old productions. Own price and consumer income have the expected negative and positive effects on attendance. Observed trends toward a decreasing proportion of new plays, an increasing presence of plays by Dutch-speaking playwrights, and increasing consumer income had a stimulating effect on attendance. These trends have been offset, however, by trends toward smaller cast sizes and higher ticket prices as well as by unobserved factors captured by time dummies. The net result has been a considerable drop in attendance.

Determinants of cultural and popular celebration attendance: the case study of Seville Spring Fiestas

The Spring Fiestas in Seville (Spain) (SFS) are the most important cultural events in the city each year. The present paper pursues two aims. The first is to characterize the SFS as a new prototype of a complex cultural good that expresses the link between the people and the place in which they live based on material and immaterial cultural heritage represented through popular celebrations. The second goal is to conduct an empirical analysis of the determinants that shape attendance intensity by estimating a zero-truncated count data model using a unique dataset of attendees at the SFS in 2009. Findings indicate that attendance is strongly associated with variables reflecting knowledge, institutional links, past experiences, and the perceived external benefits generated by the existence of the SFS. The article contributes to the literature by exploring participation in popular celebrations, a field of inquiry that to date is extremely limited in cultural economics.     

DVD sales and the R-rating puzzle

In the last decade, attendance at movie theaters has been relatively stagnant, while sales of digital versatile discs (DVDs) have grown dramatically. In this paper, we look at the factors determining sales of individual DVDs in the United States. Using data on new motion pictures released on DVD between 2006 and 2008, we find the demand for new DVDs is price-inelastic and that DVD sales are counter-cyclical. We find that previous box office success has strong positive effects on DVD sales. Production budget also has a positive effect on DVD sales, albeit indirectly through its effect on box office revenues. Critical acclaim has significant positive effects on both box office revenue and DVD sales, but the effect is smaller in regard to DVDs. There is some evidence to suggest that DVD sales are higher for movies with more sexual content and more violent content and lower for movies with more profanity, but these effects are indirect through the changes in the box office of these movies. We find that sales of R-rated DVDs are not as dependent upon critical acclaim as movies of other ratings, and are thus less risky for movie studios to produce. Our findings provide another explanation for the R-rating puzzle.     

Determining heterogeneous behavior for theater attendance

In this paper we propose and estimate a model of theater participation using the data contained in the 2002 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts from the USA, a dataset widely used to study the determinants of cultural participation. Our contribution relies on the use of an estimation technique that respects the count data nature of the attendance variable (number of theater performances that an individual attended) and allows for heterogeneous behavior. By using a Zero Inflated Negative Binomial Model, we can characterize two distinct behaviors for the observable attendance: a group of never-goers (who never participate) and a subpopulation that has a positive probability of attending. For this latter group, we can estimate the effect of certain personal variables on the probability of highest frequency. The results suggest that the proposed model is appropriate for estimating cultural participation.

Access to and participation in the arts: The case of those with low incomes/educational attainment

This paper looks at the issue of access to the arts in terms of the very unequal attendance at and audiences for the high arts by educational grouping. The meaning of equal access is analysed, recent data for two countries, namely the United States and Ireland, are examined and new evidence is proffered. The constraints/barriers to, and the rationale for, more equal attendance/audiences are examined. The paper concludes by outlining a number of possible responses to this continuing problem.This paper was presented at the 9th international conference of the Association for Cultural Economics, held in Boston, May 8–11, 1996.     

A good hustle: the moral economy of market competition in adult webcam modeling

In this article, we examine how models working on Chaturbate, one of the world’s most popular adult webcam platforms, negotiate and make sense of the dynamic ways in which this platform configures their competitive environment. By combining different perspectives from the field of economic sociology, we demonstrate how competition on Chaturbate is shaped by various market devices whose strategic negotiation informs – and is informed by – the moral economy articulated on web forums where models gather to discuss their work experiences and market strategies. We first introduce Chaturbate and the ways in which it organizes market competition, surveying the environment models have to negotiate. We then zoom in on two controversial strategies for beating the competition, each of which upset the moral economy of Chaturbate’s model community. Subsequently, we turn to what models term ‘the hustle,’ which encompasses a number of competitive strategies and criteria judged to be fair and thus legitimate. The final part of our analysis considers the limitations of the hustle, as well as the meritocratic and entrepreneurial discourse that surround it, in light of what we identify as Chaturbate’s ‘manufactured uncertainty.’     

Demand for Live Theater with Market Segmentation and Seasonality

Using performance level box-office receipts from the PacificConservatory of the Performing Arts over eight years, we analyzeperformance-level demand for live theater. The disaggregated data allowsus to estimate demand at a particular venue and to characterize theseasonality of demand for live theater. We examine whether the supply ofshows matches the differentiated tastes of theater-goers at each of thethree locations and the sensitivity of demand to critical reviews andprior attendance.     

The Role of Competition in the Rise of Baroque and Renaissance Music

Section 1 introduces the hypothesis that competition among neighboring states may favor cultural innovation, and it surveys the available quantitative evidence. Section 2 starts from the assumption that European instrumental music had its breakthrough during the Baroque era and that the most famous composers came from the two countries characterized by the highest degree of political fragmentation: Italy and Germany. It suggests that political fragmentation has promoted musical composition and performance in several ways. The average duration of employment is proposed as a proxy for competition on the demand side. Section 3 shows that the most famous Italian and German composers of the Baroque period changed their employers significantly more often than their French and British counterparts did. Moreover, the Reformation led to musical competition between the Catholic and Protestant churches. Section 4 argues that competition for composers has also been important in other periods of European history – including competition between the Church and the courts. It shows that composers moved no less in the Renaissance than in the Baroque. Section 5 raises the question whether European music may also be said to express a competitive spirit. JEL classification: Z11     

The structure of the American book publishing industry

This paper investigates several structural elements of the American book publishing industry in order to resolve two conflicting viewpoints advanced by publishing figures regarding intra-industry competition. The evidence presented indicates that the minimum optimal production scale (0.30 to 0.70 percent of industry's employment) is too small to obstruct entry, to preclude the existence of a large number of publishers, and to foreclose from it a high degree of competition.     

Strategic timing of entry: evidence from video games

This paper investigates how video game publishers’ choice of game release date is affected by the expected level of competition within the game’s product niche. We identify game niches by genre, age-appropriateness, console system, a release cohort, and publisher. First, we show that games are more likely to be released so as to avoid weeks when their niche already faces competition. Next, we show that consumer substitution across games is stronger within most of the dimensions describing product niches. Sales volumes decay quickly after the opening weekend, so at any point in time, a niche will typically be served by few current titles. From this, we calculate that delaying game release 1 week yields substantial increase in revenue for a video game facing higher-than-average competition.     

Making architecture compete: open-ended accumulation meets objectification and singularisation in the UK construction industry

Sociologists over the last two decades have taken inspiration from actor-network theory to suggest that competition, like ‘the market’, takes place through a dynamic of detaching objects from one set of relations and reattaching them within another: objectification and singularisation. Yet there has been little theorisation of how competition differs between situations. To approach this question, we can ask how competition, as a process of objectification and singularisation, interacts with other patterns of movement. Ethnographers have described one such pattern in the everyday work of architects. Here a building emerges from an ever-increasing number of ‘versions’, images and models, in an open-ended accumulation. This study considers the interaction between, first, the objectification and singularisation of competition and, second, the open-ended accumulation of architectural work. To do so, I examine architectural competitions in the UK. I draw from document analysis of one competition for a school in northern England, as well as interviews with architects about their work on competitions. This study concludes that architectural competitions repeat the multiplicity of architectural work but in a more delimited form. Multiplicity is not ‘cut-off’ so much as winnowed down through an explicit process of selecting images and blocks of text.