Milk by Any Other Name... Consumer Benefits from Labeled Milk

This article uses revealed preferences of consumers to study the consumer benefits from rBST-free and organic labeled milk. The article specifies and estimates a quadratic AIDS demand system model for different milk types using US supermarket scanner data. The introduction of rBST-free and organic milk is used to estimate consumer benefits, which are decomposed into two components, competitive and variety effects. Results show significant consumer benefits from organic milk and to a lesser extent from rBST-free milk. Based on the findings, we explore implications for present U.S. labeling standards.