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SUMMARYIncome evaluation and happiness in a number of life domains of people who had experienced an income decline were studied. 800 Participants in a survey indicated whether they had sought information and had taken precautionary measures to mitigate the effects of the lower income. By using Categorical Principal Components Analysis on this data, two scales capturing their reported behavior were constructed. The scales significantly explained people's income evaluation and happiness, in addition to their household income, family composition, and reasons for the income drop. Conclusions for budget advice and education in household financial management were drawn.

This comment is part of a symposium on Ekkehart Schlicht, On Custom in the Economy (1998)

Summary: Different shapes of individual subjective discount functions were compared using real measures of willingness to accept future monetary outcomes in an experiment. The two-parameter hyperbolic discount function described the data better than three alternative one-parameter discount functions. However, the hyperbolic discount functions did not explain the common difference effect better than the classical discount function. Discount functions were also estimated from survey data of Dutch households who reported their willingness to postpone positive and negative amounts. Future positive amounts were discounted more than future negative amounts and smaller amounts were discounted more than larger amounts. Furthermore, younger people discounted more than older people. Finally, discount functions were used in explaining consumers' willingness to pay for an energy-saving durable good. In this case, the two-parameter discount model could not be estimated and the one-parameter models did not differ significantly in explaining the data.

A service encounter can be considered as a sequence of events. In the early service literature, it was assumed that firms should deliver a consistent performance during a service encounter. However, research in psychology states that this is not necessarily true. In addition to the average performance, the peaks in the performance are important. Likewise, some service researchers have stressed the importance of a happy ending. The authors test a model on how events contribute to the overall evaluation of a sequence of events. They show that the average performance during the encounter is important. However, their results also stress the importance of peak experiences for satisfaction formation. Thus, managers of service encounters should not only manage the overall performance of a service encounter. To further elevate satisfaction, they could also provide some positive peak experiences.