Consumer Behaviours

Abstract This chapter builds on some general empirical properties of consumption decisions and their evolution. We present a simple model which tries to capture—albeit in a quite rudimentary form—phenomena like the existence of recognizably different ‘lifestyles’, lexicographic orders on consumption acts, (limited) path-dependency of individual and collective consumption patterns, innovation, and social imitation. It turns out that, despite its simplicity, the model generates emerging aggregate patterns of consumption with statistical properties quite in tune with empirically observed regularities, such as S-shaped diffusion of new commodities and Engel-type dynamics of budget shares. It is also able to generate, under quite a few micro-parametrizations, distributions of consumption coefficients yielding, in the aggregate, notional downward-sloping demand curves.