“Regulation of Food Quality: Deep Capture and Economies of Scope between Innovation and Influence”

In this paper, existing work on credence goods is extended to include a "diagnosis" stage whereby ill-informed consumers rely on a third party to certify that food products have beneficial characteristics. This compares to existing models of credence goods which focus only on a "treatment" stage, i.e., food is simply certified as having such characteristics. Adding the diagnosis stage allows for "deep capture" by food producers who attempt to influence regulatory outcomes on what quality claims can be made about food products: specifically an innovator, the “expert”, can expend resources to “nudge” regulatory assessment of quality samples in a positive direction, assuming also that there are economies of scope between innovation and influence.