Research Catalog

Paying with plastic : the digital revolution in buying and borrowing

Title
Paying with plastic : the digital revolution in buying and borrowing / David S. Evans, Richard Schmalensee.
Author
Evans, David S. (David Sparks), 1954-
Publication
Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, [1999], ©1999.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Filter by

1 Item

StatusFormatAccessCall NumberItem Location
Request for On-site UseRequest Scan
Not available - Please for assistance.
TextRequest in advance HG3755.8.U6 E94 1999Off-site

Holdings

Details

Additional Authors
Schmalensee, Richard.
Description
xii, 373 pages : illustrations; 24 cm
Summary
  • "In Paying with Plastic, David Evans and Richard Schmalensee provide a nontechnical distillation of their years of research on the economic, technological, and institutional forces that have shaped the payment card industry. They show how competition works in an industry that does not nearly fit any of the standard economic models.
  • They describe how the entrepreneurs in this industry solved the chicken-and-egg problem: merchants will not take cards if few consumers use them, and consumers will not use cards if few merchants take them. They also describe how the payment card companies such as MasterCard and Visa have developed complex systems for coordinating transactions among their thousands of bank members and millions of card-holders and accepting merchants.
  • Evans and Schmalensee also describe recent developments in the industry and consider its likely evolution."--BOOK JACKET.
Subject
  • Credit cards > United States
  • Bank credit cards > United States
  • Electronic funds transfers > United States
  • Electronic commerce > United States
  • Consumer credit > United States
Bibliography (note)
  • Includes bibliographical references (p. [349]-359) and index.
Contents
1. Plastic Cards -- 2. From Sea Shells to Electrons -- 3. A Land of Local Banks, Awash in Paper Checks -- 4. The Rise of Payment Cards -- 5. From Gourmets to the Masses -- 6. Everywhere You Want to Be, Not Everywhere They Want to Be -- 7. Chickens, Eggs, and Other Economic Conundrums -- 8. System Wars -- 9. Issuer Brawls -- 10. Puzzles and Paradoxes -- 11. The Antitrust Wars -- 12. Debit Takes Off (Finally) -- 13. And They Don't Take Cash.
ISBN
0262050625 (hc : alk. paper)
LCCN
99023902
OCLC
ocm41266035
Owning Institutions
Columbia University Libraries