Habit, bse, and the dynamics of beef consumption.

摘要

Habit persistence is related to recurring food safety incidents in the context of the initial three cases of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in Canadian cows. We test Engel functions, using generalized method of moments procedures, to analyze the dynamics of monthly beef expenditure shares of a sample of Canadian households during years 2002 through 2005. From microlevel panel data which followed meat expenditures by Canadian households before and after the first three BSE cases, which were discovered in 2003 and 2005, it is seen that households' reactions to these followed a similar general pattern: households reduced beef purchase expenditures following the discovery of BSE but expenditures subsequently recovered. Following the initial BSE event, we identify an immediate negative impact on beef expenditures. However, in the case of the second two BSE events, this negative impact was not evident until two months after the BSE announcements. The results suggest that habit persistence initially limited households' reductions of beef purchases following the first BSE event. However, households with higher beef expenditure shares reduced expenditure more than others following the second two BSE events, suggesting that habitual patterns of high levels of consumption tended to change with the recurrence of these food safety events