Factors Influencing Demand in Major League Baseball: Steroid Policy, Discrimination, and Uncertainty of Outcome.

Abstract

The research presented in this dissertation represents three distinct types of issues influencing demand. Chapter II examines how a policy change affected revenues. The results show that there was a financial incentive to not enact and enforce a policy punishing users of performance enhancing drugs. Chapter III measures the change in demand for teams attributable to foreign-born players on the squad. The results show fans have changed their bias from anti- to pro-foreign players over the period from 1985-2005. Chapter IV questions how fans level of consumption is affected by the relative uncertainty of a game and season’s outcome. The findings are that fans prefer to attend games when their team is in a better position to make the playoffs, when the game itself is important to determining playoff qualification, and when their team’s standing is similar to that of the previous season. While each study represents a different subset of studies within the literature on sport economics, each is aimed specifically at learning more about fan preferences and measuring their impact on demand.