Results

CEP discussion paper

The global effects of carbon border adjustment mechanisms

We study carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) policies, as currently being implemented by the EU and UK. Policy discussions have cited three motivations and one concern. CBAMs can improve domestic competitiveness in...Read more...

Blog

LSE USA PP:

For US coal workers, earnings losses from the decline of their industry have been large and lasting

In the 2010s, coal mining employment in the US declined by over 50 percent. In new research, Jonathan Colmer and Eleanor Krause look at how costly this change has been for coal workers. The researchers find that these wo...Read more...

Blog

Vox EU:

Income, wealth, and environmental inequality in the US

Economic disparities have long been suspected to be a root cause of environmental inequality. But is this really the case? This column links data on income and wealth with data on air pollution exposure over 40 years to ...Read more...

Journal article

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics:

Do Carbon Offsets Offset Carbon?

We develop and implement a new method for identifying wasted subsidies and use it to provide systematic evidence of the misallocation of carbon offsets in the Clean Development Mechanism - the world's largest carbon offs...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Income, wealth and environmental inequality in the United States

This paper explores the relationships between air pollution, income, and wealth by combining administrative data from U.S. tax returns between 1979-2016, various measures of air pollution, and sociodemographic informatio...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Transitional costs and the decline in coal: Worker-level evidence

The outside options available to workers critically determine the transitional costs of labor demand shocks. Using comprehensive administrative data, we examine the worker-level effects of the decline of coal - a regiona...Read more...

CentrePiece article

in brief... Designing carbon markets that deliver change

Ever since the European Union created its market-based carbon policy, governments and businesses have been keen to assess its impact. Jonathan Colmer, Ralf Martin, Mirabelle Muûls and Ulrich Wagner explain why analysing ...Read more...

Journal article

The Review of Economic Studies:

Does Pricing Carbon Mitigate Climate Change? Firm-Level Evidence from the European Union Emissions Trading System

In theory, market-based regulatory instruments correct market failures at least cost. However, evidence on their efficacy remains scarce. Using administrative data, we estimate that, on average, the European Union Emissi...Read more...

Journal article

AEA Papers and Proceedings:

The Changing Nature of Pollution, Income, and Environmental Inequality in the United States

This paper uses tax records linked to administrative Census data and high-resolution measures of air pollution exposure (PM2.5) to study the evolution of the Black-White pollution exposure gap since 1984. We decompose ch...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

The changing nature of pollution, income and environmental inequality in the United States

This paper uses administrative tax records linked to Census demographic data and high-resolution measures of fine small particulate (PM2.5) exposure to study the evolution of the Black-White pollution exposure gap over t...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Is the electricity sector a weak link in development?

This paper asks whether increasing productivity in the electricity sector can yield larger long-run GDP gains than suggested by electricity's small share of aggregate economic activity. We answer this question using a dy...Read more...

Journal article

The Review of Economics and Statistics: Forthcoming

Access to Guns in the Heat of the Moment: More Restrictive Gun Laws Mitigate the Effect of Temperature on Violence

Gun violence is a major problem in the United States, and extensive prior work has shown that higher temperatures increase violent behavior. We consider whether restricting the concealed carry of firearms mitigates or ex...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Access to guns in the heat of the moment: more restrictive gun laws mitigate the effect of temperature on violence

Gun violence is a major problem in the United States, and extensive prior work has shown that higher temperatures increase violent behavior. We consider whether restricting the concealed carry of firearms mitigates or ex...Read more...

CentrePiece article

In brief... How citizens help expose environmental wrongdoing

Does enabling citizens to complain about public services provide an effective way of improving government services, or should we be concerned about the accuracy and reliability of such reports? Jonathan Colmer, Mary Evan...Read more...

Blog

LSE USAPP:

Citizen complaints can be a useful early warning system for governments to act on environmental violations.

Is enabling citizens to complain about public services an effective way of improving government services, or should we be more concerned about their accuracy and reliability? In new research, Jonathan Colmer, Mary Evans,...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Environmental citizen complaints

Citizen complaints feature prominently in public oversight contexts. The nature and effects of complaints, however, are controversial and poorly understood. Here, we exploit novel administrative data on over 130,000 envi...Read more...

Journal article

American Journal of Agricultural Economics: Forthcoming

Blame it on the rain: rainfall variability, consumption smoothing, and subjective well-being in rural Ethiopia

How does income uncertainty affect individual well-being? Combining individual-level panel data from rural Ethiopia with high-resolution meteorological data, we estimate that mean-preserving increases in rainfall variabi...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Do carbon offsets offset carbon?

We develop and implement a new method for identifying wasted subsidies and use it to provide systematic evidence of the misallocation of carbon offsets in the Clean Development Mechanism - the world's largest carbon offs...Read more...

Blog

Economics Observatory:

How does climate change shape inequality, poverty and economic opportunity?

Climate change and economic inequality are often considered independently of one another. Jonathan Colmer explains how these factors are inextricably linked, and neither can be addressed without engaging with the other....Read more...

Journal article

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics:

Temperature, Labor Reallocation, and Industrial Production: Evidence from India

To what degree can labor reallocation mitigate the economic consequences of weather-driven agricultural productivity shocks? I estimate that temperature-driven reductions in the demand for agricultural labor in India are...Read more...

Journal article

Journal of Health Economics:

Why are pollution damages lower in developed countries? Insights from high-Income, high-particulate matter Hong Kong

Conventional wisdom suggests that marginal damages from particulate matter pollution are high in less-developed countries because they are highly polluted. Using administrative data on the universe of births and deaths, ...Read more...

Journal article

American Journal of Agricultural Economics:

Rainfall Variability, Child Labor, and Human Capital Accumulation in Rural Ethiopia

How does income uncertainty affect human capital investments in agrarian economies? Using child-level panel data, I exploit a medium-run change in mean-preserving rainfall variability to identify the effects of income un...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

The grandkids aren't alright: the intergenerational effects of prenatal pollution exposure

Using newly linked survey and administrative data we provide early evidence that regulation- induced improvements in prenatal air quality have intergenerational effects on human capital accumulation in the United States....Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Does pricing carbon mitigate climate change? Firm-level evidence from the European Union emissions trading scheme

In theory, market-based regulatory instruments correct market failures at least cost. However, evidence on their efficacy remains scarce. Using administrative data, we estimate that, on average, the EU ETS - the world's ...Read more...

Journal article

Oxford Review of Economic Policy:

What is the meaning of (statistical) life? Benefit-cost analysis in the time of COVID-19

Efforts to support public policy decisions need to be conducted carefully and thoughtfully. Recent efforts to estimate the social benefits of reductions in mortality risks associated with COVID-19 interventions are likel...Read more...

Journal article

Science:

Disparities in PM2.5 air pollution in the United States

Air pollution at any given time is unequally distributed across locations. Average concentrations of fine particulate matter smaller than 2.5 micrometers in diameter (PM2.5) have fallen over time. However, we do not know...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Why are pollution damages lower in developed countries? Insights from high income, high-particulate matter Hong Kong

Conventional wisdom suggests that marginal damages from particulate matter pollution are high in less-developed countries because they are highly polluted. Using administrative data on the universe of births and deaths, ...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Temperature, labor reallocation and industrial production: evidence from India

To what degree can labor reallocation mitigate the economic consequences of weather-driven agricultural productivity shocks? I estimate that temperature-driven reductions in the demand for agricultural labor in India are...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Consumption smoothing and the welfare cost of uncertainty

How does income uncertainty affect individual well-being? Combining individual-level panel data from rural Ethiopia with high-resolution meteorological data, we estimate that mean-preserving increases in rainfall variabi...Read more...

CEP election analysis

#ElectionEconomics: The Research Evidence on Key Issues for Voters in the 2015 UK General Election

Please see the CEP #ElectionEconomics report(Paper 1)and the Executive Summary (Paper 2) that cover all the election 2015 briefings, discussing the research evidence on 15 of the UK's key policy battlegrounds: immigratio...Read more...

CEP election analysis

Energy and the Environment: a cold climate for climate change policies?

The UK's main political parties have all pledged to combat climate change whatever the result of the general election. Yet according to a new report from the CEP, much of the discussion is largely rhetoric, with limited ...Read more...