The Value of the Internet for Consumers

Smaranda Pantea and Bertin Martens

No 2014-08, JRC Working Papers on Digital Economy from Joint Research Centre

Abstract: Several studies have examined the market value of paid-for internet services and internet access. This paper estimates the value of leisure time spent online for which the consumer pays no monetary price and which has become increasingly important as a leisure activity. We apply a methodology developed be Goolsbee and Klenow (2006), which relies on differences in time spent online and opportunity cost of time, to an internet users clickstream dataset for the five largest economies in the European Union (Germany, United Kingdom, France, Italy and Spain). We find that, according to our most conservative measure, leisure time spent on the internet generated a consumer surplus of between 0.6 and 1% of full income in 2011 in the countries studied. The total consumer surplus for each country amounted to between 18 billion euros (Italy) and 44 billion euros (Germany).

Keywords: Internet Services; Consumer Surplus; Leisure. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 D6 L86 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 22 pages
Date: 2014-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ict
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ipt:decwpa:2014-08

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