NORMS, SELF-SANCTIONING, AND CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PUBLIC GOOD

The relationship between norms, self-sanctioning, and people’s decisions about contributing to public goods is complex and often misunderstood in the public goods literature. We develop a model in which individuals hold an injunctive norm indicating how much they believe one should contribute to the public good. From the model we derive the following testable hypotheses: an increase in one’s perception of the norm level of contribution to the public good (1) induces negative self-sanctioning and (2) will lead one to contribute more to the public good, and (3) that contributing to the public good induces positive self-sanctioning. To test these hypotheses, we elicit stated preferences for contributions to an organization which offsets carbon emissions and a proxy for self-sanctioning, change in respondent “self-image.”public goods, norms, sanctioning, image, Environmental Economics and Policy, Public Economics, H4, Q5, D0,

The Costs of Obtaining Environmental Outcomes through Coastal Habitat Restoration

Studies examining the costs of coastal habitat restoration have focused on the cost per acre of restoration or on cost efficiency of various restoration methods. On the other hand, studies examining the benefits of restoration have focused on various ecosystem services that more directly affect welfare including amenity value, storm protection, nutrient retention and biodiversity. We examine a set of 133 Gulf of Mexico coastal habitat restoration projects to estimate the cost of obtaining average annual habitat units (AAHUs), a measure which captures the quantity and, importantly, quality of habitat restored, which is one of the more direct ecosystem service benefits from coastal restoration. AAHUs are the environmental outcome considered during the assessment of proposed projects by decision-makers and therefore are a potential measurement unit that can more closely link costs and benefits of restoration

A Challenge to Three Widely Held Ideas

Environmental valuation is the branch of environmental economics in which researchers estimate the economic value of environmental goods and services. Environmental valuation has been practiced for decades. However, there are some ideas in the field of environmental valuation held by many environmental economists and nonenvironmental economists that appear to be outdated. This article discusses three such ideas: 1) that it is better to estimate willingness-to-pay values than willingness-to-accept values; 2) that stated preference valuation methods are questionable because they are based on hypothetical choices rather than real choices; and 3) that it is better to use a repeated-choice question format than a singlechoice format in choice experiments. We discuss the origins of each idea and why the idea became prevalent in the first place.We then review recent literature, which casts doubt on the idea.We conclude with a reminder for researchers—in environmental economics and in other economic fields—to periodically reassess ideas they currently hold in light of recent research developments and in light of the context in which they are used

Teaching Undergraduate Economics: Emphasize Early the Meaning of Vertical Distances and of Their Summation Over Quantities

Many important economic concepts—for example, deadweight losses, market surplus measures, and concepts preceded by the word “total”—are graphically depicted as areas. Although many students can identify areas like total surplus appropriately in simple circumstances such as when a market is in equilibrium, many struggle to do so when the circumstances are even slightly more complex, such as when a market is not in equilibrium. The reason may be that many students do not understand how these areas are graphically derived. In this commentary, I discuss simple adjustments instructors can make to emphasize the economic meaning of vertical distances and of their summation over quantities so that students can better identify graphical representations of economic concepts even in more complex circumstances

Who Buys More Directly from Producers in the Southeastern United States? A Research Note

This paper examines factors affecting how much consumers spend when purchasing directly from producers. A joint decision framework models two decisions: 1) whether to purchase directly and 2) how much to spend. Consumers with a greater incidence of family disease or who are immigrants, prepare more meals at home, and are more concerned with U.S. food safety also spend more on food purchased directly from producers. Results suggest that farmers should develop a three-pronged marketing strategy by attracting new consumers, adopting sales promotion tools that encourage existing customers to purchase more frequently, and encouraging consumers to spend more per visit

NORMS, SELF-SANCTIONING, AND CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PUBLIC GOOD

The relationship between norms, self-sanctioning, and people’s decisions about contributing to public goods is complex and often misunderstood in the public goods literature. We develop a model in which individuals hold an injunctive norm indicating how much they believe one should contribute to the public good. From the model we derive the following testable hypotheses: an increase in one’s perception of the norm level of contribution to the public good (1) induces negative self-sanctioning and (2) will lead one to contribute more to the public good, and (3) that contributing to the public good induces positive self-sanctioning. To test these hypotheses, we elicit stated preferences for contributions to an organization which offsets carbon emissions and a proxy for self-sanctioning, change in respondent “self-image.

Overheating Willingness to Pay: Who Gets Warm Glow and What It Means for Valuation

In traditional contingent valuation, the researcher seeks the amount a respondent is willing, ceteris paribus, to pay to obtain something. But if a respondent receives a “warm glow” from a yes response, ceteris is not paribus. In estimating willingness to pay (WTP) to reduce environmental impacts from consumption of transportation fuel, we find that respondents who were relatively less environmentally focused in the past receive greater warm-glow benefits from a “yes” response and have greater "warm” WTP (WTP that includes warm-glow benefits). Yet respondents who were relatively more environmentally focused in the past have greater “cold” WTP (WTP excluding warm-glow benefits)

Consumer Imperfect Information in the Market for Expired and Nearly Expired Foods and Implications for Reducing Food Waste

A substantial source of food waste occurs when consumers and sellers dispose of expired food despite it being safe to eat. We conduct an incentive-compatible, non-hypothetical laboratory choice experiment in which 150 participants choose between food products of varying perishability level at various dates before or after their best-before dates. In one treatment, participants received information about the interpretation of food date labels. In another they received this information plus additional information on food waste due to date label confusion and its environmental impacts. We find that clarifying the meaning of date labels is insufficient to change preferences for food past its best-before date, but when a link between date labels, food waste, and its environmental impacts is made, participants’ willingness-to-pay for expired food increases, particularly for expired frozen or recently expired semi-perishable products. Our findings have implications for food waste reduction efforts because increasing the value of expired food increases the opportunity cost of wasting expired but consumable food

Using Multiple-Scenario Contingent Valuation Data to Estimate Willingness to Pay for Restoration of Mississippi’s Barrier Islands

This research applies a novel method of non-market valuation to the case of barrier island restoration in Mississippi. The objective is to estimate peoples’ willingness to pay (WTP) for restoration to pre-Camille status (i.e., as the barriers islands existed prior to Hurricane Camille in 1969). This is accomplished by incorporating the WTP responses for the Pre-Camille status as well as WTP data from two alternative restoration scenarios. An interval censored model was used to estimate WTP and compare WTP in both the single bounded model and the novel approach. This study found that the novel method introduced here results in higher WTP estimate: WTP under the standard single bounded model is $145.74, whereas the novel approach yields a mean WTP of$204.26