Intuition behind the Compensating Variation!

economicsoptimizationutility

In Economics, we can calculate the compensating variation (CV), which (to my understanding) is the amount of money we would need to give back to a consumer to keep them at the same level of Utility after a price increase:

For a standard objective function e.g. $U(x,y) = x^{1/2}y^{1/2}$ and budget line $P_xx + P_yy = M$

Optimal $U_0 = \frac{M}{2(P_xP_y)^{1/2}}$

The formulae given to me in my book for calculating CV is as follows (I understand if it's compensating variation $∆M$ will actually be negative given how the following is constructed):

$\frac{M – ∆M}{2(P_x'P_y)^{1/2}} = U_0 = \frac{M}{2(P_xP_y)^{1/2}}$ and solve for $∆M$

  • Where $P_x'$ is our increased price for $x$
  • $U_1 = \frac{M}{2(P_x'P_y)^{1/2}}$ is the new utility with respect to the price increase.

Question 1: Why is it not $\frac{M}{2(P_x'P_y)^{1/2}} – ∆M = U_0$? This seems to be a more strait forward way of adding/subtracting the additional income to keep us on $U_0$. The original formulation seems to be more about adding/subtracting Utility? I.e. we could define a $U_1' = \frac{∆M}{2(P_x'P_y)^{1/2}}$

  • What's the intuition here?

Question 2: Given the Utility function $U(x,y) = xy$ and the same budget constraint, we get optimal utility: $\frac{M^2}{4(P_x'P_y)}$

What would be the correct equation for compensating variation and why:

  1. $\frac{M^2 – ∆M}{4(P_x'P_y)} = U_0$
  2. $\frac{(M – ∆M)^2}{4(P_x'P_y)} = U_0$
  3. $\frac{M^2 – ∆M^2}{4(P_x'P_y)} = U_0$
  4. $\frac{M^2}{4(P_x'P_y)} – ∆M = U_0$

The first option works – I have worked through a numerical example and also compared the $∆M$ you get here with the $∆M$ you get from solving it in terms of the expenditure function.

  • But i would love help on the intuition about why it's the first, and not the others (Assuming they don't work!)

Thank you!

Best Answer

First, if I knew nothing about CV, I would say that that your intuition on computing it, namely

$$\frac{M}{2(P_x'P_y)^{1/2}} - ∆M = U_0,$$

looks wrong just on the basis of units. The second term on the left-hand side has units of dollars, while first term on the left-hand side has units of

$$ {\text{dollars}\over \sqrt{\text{dollars}^2\over (\text{unit of x})\cdot (\text{unit of y}) }}=\sqrt{(\text{unit of x})\cdot (\text{unit of y})}.$$

A quick dimensional analysis sometimes tell us a lot.


Now, I think both your questions will be cleared up with an understanding of the actual definition of CV. First start with the indirect utility function $v(P,M)$: this is the value of the maximized utility as a function of the vector of prices $P$ and income $M$. CV is defined as the amount a government would need to tax you after a price change to keep you just as well off as before the price change:

$$v(P_1,M-CV)=U_0=v(P_0,M).$$

In particular, assuming indirect utility decreases in prices, CV will be positive if prices fall; contrastingly, CV will be negative if prices rise (i.e. government would have to subsidize you).

Your examples are special cases of Cobb-Douglas utilities. You can see option 2 would be the appropriate equation for your question 2.

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