Self-paced
To discourage congestion, a city raised on-street parking rates in a downtown business district. ███ ███████████ ██ ███ █████████ █████ █████████ ███████ ██████████ ████████ ███ ██████████ ██████ ███ █ █████ ████████ ██ ██████
"Surprising" Phenomenon
Why did restaurants whose customers use short-term parking see an increase in sales when the city raised parking rates?
Objective
The correct answer will be a hypothesis that explains why an increased short-term parking rate helped downtown restaurants, despite their customers needing short-term parking. The explanation must result in people being more likely to go to restaurants as a result of higher parking costs. For example, perhaps the higher rate freed up parking spots that people would’ve otherwise occupied under the lower rate.
6.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ ███████████ ██ ██ ███████████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ █████ ██ ███████████ ██ ███ █████████
a
Customers of the ██████████ ██████████ ███ ████ ███ ███████ ███████ █████ █████ ███ █████████ ████ █████████ ████ █████████ ████████
These other lots are simply a constant that don’t factor into the apparent paradox. They don't help us explain why restaurants did better after the rate increase.
b
Owners of the ██████████ ███████████ ███ ███ ████ █████ █████████ ███████ ███ ███████ ██ ███ █████████ ███████ ██████
It doesn’t matter what owners thought of the new parking rate. The rate went into effect, and we need to know why that rate had the result it did.
c
Even before the ██████ ██ ███████ ██████ ███ ██████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██ ███ ████████ ████ ████ ██████████ ████████
If anything, this eliminates a possible explanation that the new rate freed up more parking for customers. We need something that explains what changed for the new rate to help restaurants.
d
More expensive parking █████ ██ ███████ ████████ ██ ████ ██████ ██ █████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██ ███ █████████
Since the new rate leads to higher turnover, more total people began parking in front of the restaurants than before. The restaurants thus had more potential customers throughout the day, which explains why their profits increased.
e
The business district ██ ██ ███████████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ ███████ ██ █████ ██████████
If anything, the new rate would seem to hurt the restaurants even more if customers had a free alternative elsewhere. This doesn’t explain how the new rate helped restaurants.