Consumer protection shifts risks from consumers to businesses. This raises marginal costs and equilibrium prices. It is justified when markets are not strong enough to allocate contractual risks or accident risks efficiently, especially in cases of severe asymmetric information between suppliers and consumers. Consumer protection can then increase the consumer’s expected welfare from a contract. We test these considerations in a theoretical and empirical study on consumers' right to early repayment of mortgage loans without damage compensation to the creditor in the European Union. We show in a formal model that such a right can lead to an impairment of consumer welfare, compared with the traditional rule of expectation damages for breach of contract. This applies if the consumer is risk averse and repays a loan with a high interest rate in a low interest period to take up a new loan for the same project at lower interests. From a theoretical point of view, this right has no solid economic underpinning, if it is not restricted to cases of personal hardship of the consumer and serves an insurance purpose. We present empirical evidence supporting this argument. In a panel study on monthly mortgage interest rates of 23 EU Member States between 2005 and 2017 we show how interest rate spreads change with the level of consumer protection.

消费者保护将风险从消费者转移到企业。这提高了边际成本和均衡价格。当市场不足以有效分配合同风险或事故风险时，特别是在供应商和消费者之间存在严重的信息不对称的情况下，这是合理的。消费者保护可以通过合同增加消费者的预期福利。我们在一项关于消费者有权提前偿还抵押贷款且不对欧盟债权人造成损害赔偿的理论和实证研究中检验了这些考虑因素。我们在一个正式的模型中表明，与传统的违约预期损害赔偿规则相比，这种权利会导致消费者福利的损害。如果消费者厌恶风险并在低利率期间以高利率偿还贷款，以较低的利率为同一项目获得新贷款，则适用。从理论的角度来看，这项权利没有坚实的经济基础，如果它不仅限于消费者个人困难的情况并且服务于保险目的。我们提供了支持这一论点的经验证据。在 23 个欧盟成员国 2005 年至 2017 年间每月抵押贷款利率的小组研究中，我们展示了利率差如何随着消费者保护水平的变化而变化。我们提供了支持这一论点的经验证据。在 23 个欧盟成员国 2005 年至 2017 年间每月抵押贷款利率的小组研究中，我们展示了利率差如何随着消费者保护水平的变化而变化。我们提供了支持这一论点的经验证据。在 23 个欧盟成员国 2005 年至 2017 年间每月抵押贷款利率的小组研究中，我们展示了利率差如何随着消费者保护水平的变化而变化。