嘉    宾：陈智琦 教授 卡尔顿大学

主持人：陈志洪  副教授 上海交通大学安泰经济与管理学院

时    间：2026年4月24日（周五）10:00-11:30

地    点: 上海交通大学徐汇校区安泰经济与管理学院A507

内容简介：We study firms’ incentives to adopt a tracking technology to collect personal data that enable personalized pricing in an online market where some consumers have innate desires for privacy. In a model where two differentiated goods are sold under two different market structures (monopoly and duopoly), we find that the presence of these privacy-sensitive consumers alters the firms’ incentive to adopt personalized pricing. In particular, no firm uses personalized pricing in equilibrium if the proportion of privacy-sensitive consumers in the market is high. Competition, however, leads to wider use of personalized pricing. Privacy regulation that gives consumers control over whether a firm can track their online activities has the intended impact of protecting consumer privacy only if the proportion of privacy-sensitive consumers is low. Otherwise, the regulation makes the use of tracking technology more widespread. A key force that drives these results is the inability of a monopolist to commit to personalized prices that will give privacy-sensitive consumers a non-negative net surplus. This deters these consumers from purchasing from the firm. If the proportion of privacy-sensitive consumers is high, the risk of losing these consumers induces the monopolist to adopt uniform pricing. Under duopoly, competition between firms alleviates the impact of the commitment problem as the rivals undercut each other’s prices. Privacy regulation also mitigates this impact because a firm can credibly commit to offer a uniform price to those consumers who reject tracking. Consequently, both competition and privacy regulation lead to increased use of tracking technology.

演讲人简介：Zhiqi Chen is Chancellor’s Professor at Carleton University, where he has been a faculty member since 1991. His main field of specialization is industrial organization. Since receiving his PhD in economics from the University of Western Ontario in 1991, Professor Chen has published more than 50 articles in refereed journals, including leading economics journals such as the American Economic Review, Economic Journal, International Economic Review, and RAND Journal of Economics. He has served as a co-editor of the Journal of Economics and Management Strategy since 2004, and he was the Managing Editor of the Canadian Journal of Economics from 2022 to 2025. In addition, Professor Chen has extensive experience in the application of economics to competition policy and regulation.