Food Safety and Intertemporally Nonseparable Preferences in U.S. Meat Consumption

A consumer life­cycle demand system is constructed to investigate the presence of ra­ tional habits and effects of food safety information on U.S. meat consumption. Based on previous studies, information on meat recalls and media coverage of food safety events is used to measure consumer perception of meat quality. At quarterly frequen­ cies, U.S. meat demand is found to be intertemporally nonseparable, although there is mixed evidence on whether inventory effects dominate habit formation or vice versa. In general, food safety information is found to adversely affect meat demand, but some of our results are not consistent with a priori expectations. The ongoing research focuses on numerical simulations of consumer responses to alternative food safety scenarios to evaluate the economic significance of food safety information and habit formation in U.S. meat demand.