The Combined Role of Subsidy and Discussion Intervention in Demand for a Stigmatized Products

Vinish Shrestha () and Rashesh Shrestha
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Vinish Shrestha: Department of Economics, Towson University

No 2018-05, Working Papers from Towson University, Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper studies the joint role of subsidization and group discussion intervention in increasing the demand for sanitary pads – a product that is widely available but whose demand may be curtailed due to the psychological cost associated with menstrual stigmatization. The study deploys a field experiment in Nepal to randomly allocate discount coupons of various values so that participants face exogeneous variation in the effective price of sanitary pads. In addition, a randomly selected group of women in the sample participate in menstrual health-related group discussion intervention. The findings suggest that an increase in subsidy level increases the probability of adoption across both groups of women – those receiving only a subsidy and those participating in the discussion intervention coupled with a subsidy. Also, women participating in the discussion intervention have a higher adoption rate. The effects of group discussion intervention are concentrated among women with high psychological cost, whose purchase decisions are more likely to be affected by societal stigma. The results suggest that combining a subsidy with group discussion could provide a cost-effective strategy to increase the adoption of health technology whose demand is constrained by social norms.

Keywords: Price subsidies; societal stigma and awareness; estimating elasticity; menstrual health. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 I15 I26 O33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 78 pages
Date: 2018-11, Revised 2023-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp and nep-hea
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http://webapps.towson.edu/cbe/economics/workingpapers/2018-05.pdf First version, 2018 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: The Combined Role of Subsidy and Discussion Intervention in the Demand for a Stigmatized Product (2023)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:tow:wpaper:2018-05

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