Recycling decisions of low-carbon e-commerce closed-loop supply chain under government subsidy mechanism and altruistic preference

For a low-carbon e-commerce closed-loop supply chain (LCE-CLSC), the influence of a government subsidy and a remanufacturer’s altruistic preference on the decision-making is discussed. Additionally, from the perspective of social value, decisions of LCE-CLSC are compared and analyzed. On this basis, the ‘Altruistic Preference Joint Commission’ contract is given to realize the system coordination. Finally, verify the models’ conclusions by the numerical analysis. The results are as follows: government subsidies improve the overall supply chain operational efficiency and the total social surplus. The altruistic preference behavior increases the revenue of the e-commerce platform and improves the efficiency of the LCE-CLSC, but is not advantageous to the remanufacturer. In addition, the effects of altruistic behavior on promoting the recycling of waste products are inferior to the effects of government subsidies of the same strength. Both the consumer surplus and the total social surplus are the highest under the centralized model. The increase in the consumers’ awareness of low-carbon environmental protections is seen to increase the substantiality of the contract negotiation space and the feasibility of the coordination mechanism of the ‘Altruistic Preference Joint Commission’ contract as well.