Abstract

While budgeting in advance is seen as a good practice to control spending, this research shows that budgeting too early for a specific purchase may increase spending. We argue that as the temporal separation between budget setting and actual purchase increases, consumers become more willing to overspend because of what we term “budget depreciation.” Consumers adapt to the reference point set by the budget such that, over time, the budgeted level becomes the status-quo spending. Thus, as more time passes, pain of payment from the budgeted amount decreases, and the willingness-to-spend increases. Across a secondary dataset of real estate purchases, one field study, and three experiments, we find evidence that consumers who set a budget in the distant (vs. near) past are more likely to overspend relative to their budget. The effect emerges for single purchase occasions rather than a category of purchases over multiple occasions. It emerges because of the hypothesized pain-of-payment process (e.g., effect is stronger among tightwads, who feel greater pain from spending; effect is mitigated under budget reassessment, which prevents pain adaptation). Our work contributes to the mental budgeting literature by invoking a role for temporal separation and draws a novel connection to prior work on payment depreciation.

中文翻译：

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预算折旧：早期预算增加支出时

摘要

虽然提前预算被认为是控制支出的一种好习惯，但这项研究表明，针对特定购买进行过早预算可能会增加支出。我们认为，随着预算设定与实际购买之间的时间间隔增加，由于我们所说的“预算折旧”，消费者变得更愿意超支。消费者适应预算设定的参考点，这样，随着时间的流逝，预算水平将成为现状支出。因此，随着时间的流逝，预算额度的支付痛苦减少，支出意愿增加。在不动产购买的次要数据集，一项实地研究和三个实验中，我们发现有证据表明，在遥远的过去（相对于过去）制定预算的消费者相对于预算而言，更有可能超支。这种效果出现在单次购买的场合，而不是多次购买的类别。之所以出现这种情况，是因为假设存在付款痛苦的过程（例如，在花钱中的效果更强，他们因支出而感到更大的痛苦；在预算重新评估后效果减弱了，这阻止了痛苦的适应）。我们的工作通过时间间隔的作用为精神预算文献做出了贡献，并与以前有关付款折旧的工作形成了新颖的联系。