An Analysis of Market Shares on the Danish Alcohol Market Using Unobserved Components

The Danish alcohol market has three types of alcohol: Beer, Wine and Spirits. The market share of wine has doubled over a 25 year period, while the market share of beer has been declining and the market share of spirits is generally low and fluctuating. In recent years the trending behavior has however changed, most likely because of changes in taxation on spirits. In the paper these market shares are analyzed by unobserved components models using Proc Ucm as models with time varying trends etc. are well suited for this type of data. In Denmark the relative prices for the three types of alcohol have changed radically because of changes in the taxation and hence the relative prices provide good independent variables in regressions.