The Thammasat University Library has newly acquired a book that should be useful for students interested in economics, biology, sociology, psychology, ecology, veterinary science, anthropology, archaeology, and related fields.

Dog Economics: Perspectives on Our Canine Relationships is by David L. Weimer and Aidan R. Vining.

Professor Weimer teaches political economy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the United States of America.

Emeritus Professor Vining taught business and government relations at Simon Fraser University, British Columbia, Canada.

The TU Library collection also includes other books about different aspects of dogs.

The authors note that most households see dogs as family members.

This means that dogs are not just commodities traded in markets, but also cherished household participants.

Dog Economics explores this dual nature of pets and other aspects of the human rapport with dogs from the perspective of economic concepts.

Dogs have attracted scholarly attention from behavioral biologists, ecologists, veterinarians, anthropologists, archaeologists, sociologists, and historians.

The authors use their research to state information about dogs, which should interest scholars in these fields as well as general readers.

Until now, economists have done relatively little research on dogs.

Applying economic concepts to dog-related issues allows the authors to propose a new academic field of dogonomics.

Dog Economics introduces and applies economic concepts relevant to life with dogs, as a supplementary text for microeconomics courses.

Some examples: The increase in the number of dogs adopted during the COVID pandemic may be understood as both the increased value of companionship and lower opportunity costs of having dogs when people are isolated in their homes.

Dogs as complements to, or substitutes for, children illustrate concepts from the economics of the family.

The increases in the demand for dog breeds featured in movies can be explained by the economic theory of fads.

Theories of the origin of the affinity between people and dogs and their subsequent co-evolution provide an introduction into simple classical and evolutionary game theories.

Several chapters provide new perspectives on aspects of interactions with canines.

With a comprehensive glossary of economic terms, the book should have value as an introductory text for concepts in microeconomics.

The authors write:

[W]e seek to determine how much of our love for dogs can be understood as economically rational behavior, whether neoclassically perfect or behaviorally imperfect. So, we characterize decisions about dogs as choices involving trade-offs as in most other choices we make in our lives. We take the liberty of calling this project dogonomics.

One might ask why we focus particularly on the relationship between people and dogs? Well, for a start, the large scale of the market for pet-related goods and services means it is economically important, in terms of expenditures of both money and time. In 2021, U.S. consumers spent $123.6 billion on pet products. The approximately half of households that own dogs are responsible for much of this spending. Dogs are the most frequently kept pet. Some people face substantial upfront costs when they purchase dogs from breeders. In terms of ongoing expenditures, annual averages for dogs in the United States include $458 for surgical veterinary visits, $242 for routine veterinary visits, $287 for food, $81 for food treats, $228 for kennel boarding, $81 for vitamins, $47 for grooming aids, and $56 for toys for a total of $1,480. Beyond this recurring spending, some dog caregivers are willing to make exceptionally large expenditures for veterinary care for very ill or injured dogs. In addition to direct expenditures, many owners now purchase insurance to reduce the risk of having to pay for costly veterinary services. Beyond costs borne directly by dog owners, municipalities also bear costs, usually passing along the costs of licensing to owners through fees but increasingly passing along the costs of dog parks to taxpayers. Further, the care and feeding of dogs increases our carbon footprint. Thus, dog ownership, and related activities, such as the training of guide and therapy dogs, involve considerable economic activity.

In modern societies, morality and law prohibit the commodification of children or parents or other persons in a dependent position. However, dogs (and we probably must admit cats) often have an unusual dual status as both commodities and what can best be described as family members. That is, many people make economic decisions about obtaining and owning dogs as if they were members of the family. Indeed, some experimental evidence suggests that, similar to parental spending on children, spending on pets makes people happier than spending on themselves. However, our canine household members can be legally bought, sold, and disposed of subject to only minimal restrictions. The economics of the family has been a vibrant area of economic and policy scholarship. This field encompasses many important subjects, such as the allocation of time by parents and the degree of utility interdependence among family members. How does the role of dogs within the family fit within the economic models of the family? Or does it require some other, or at least expanded, framework? The perspective we present in this book is that, regardless of whether dog owners embrace their dogs as members of the family, almost all owners would consider them to be unlike any other commodity.

Beyond their economic significance and unique status as both commodity and family member, a growing body of research documents the impacts of dogs on human health. These impacts, collectively referred to as zooeyia, include a range of health benefits and health risks that dogs bestow on their owners. They give dogs’ relevance to public health.

Zooeyiatic impacts manifest through a variety of mechanisms. Petting and grooming dogs provides tactile simulation, increasingly seen as important for human wellbeing. Dogs’ demands for walks almost certainly increase the frequency and quality of their owners’ outdoor exercise. Dogs out and about on walks and runs often attract the attention of other dog owners or people who would like to be dog owners. As we are prone to do so, we can elevate this to a social science insight by noting that walking a dog may increase the owner’s stock of social capital by prompting contact with neighbors and fellow dog park users that would otherwise not occur. The evidence suggests that the companionship provided by dogs may also have psychological benefits beyond the enjoyment of shared time; contact with dogs may even contribute to the development of the immune system in the children of their owners. […]

Aside from scholarly motives for seeking to understand the economics of owning dogs, we have a personal motivation: we are quite fond of dogs. We are fond of our current dogs and have happy memories of our departed dogs that we brought into our families (as well as those that managed to wheedle their way in). We are also sympathetic to most of the dogs we encounter on the street or in dog parks. We even sometimes fall victim to click bait that is dog-themed. Thus, beyond the professorial satisfaction of contributing to what we hope will be considered scholarship, we enjoy studying the essential ingredient of dogonomics – dogs!

(All images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)