The Low-Cost-Hypothesis. An Empirical Test Taking the Support for a City Toll as an Example

Abstract

The low-cost hypothesis (LCH) postulates that the effect of an attitude on attitude-conforming behavior decreases with rising costs of attitude conformity. Using a microeconomic model, Tutić et al. (2017) formalized the theoretical implications of the LCH. They illustrated that the LCH can fail using the previously common approach involving the explicit inclusion of an interaction term, whereas it holds using the enhanced test strategy. However, the presented examples allow only a limited test of the LCH in the more general sense of an income effect and not in the narrower sense of an actual price effect of attitude-conforming behavior. This article provides an important supplement by presenting the first test of the improved test strategy of the LCH in the narrower sense, using support for a city toll as an example. The data are based on a factorial survey in which more than 1300 respondents rated more than 5300 fictitious toll models as part of a population survey in Munich and four surrounding municipalities in the early summer of 2018. According to the presented analysis of the support for a city toll, the LCH holds using the improved test strategy.