Event Information
The next EEU Seminar will be held on Monday the 16nd of December at 12:10 – 13:00 in B44.
The seminar will be held by our own Jens Ewald, he is a PhD candidate in his final year, at the Department of Economics at the University of Gothenburg. Ewald will present his job market paper Shocking Electricity Prices and Carbon Tax Aversion. His research interests lie primarily within the fields of environmental economics, political economy, and applied microeconomics more generally.
When: Monday, December 16nd at 12:10-13:00
Location: B44 or via Zoom.
Speaker: Jens Ewald
Title: Shocking Electricity Prices and Carbon Tax Aversion
Abstract: I study the causal impact of exposure to high electricity prices on public support for carbon taxation, utilizing a geographic regression discontinuity design and a targeted survey of Swedish households near electricity bidding zone borders. I find that exposure to doubled electricity prices reduces support for carbon taxation by about 10 percentage points. Additionally, this exposure skews respondents' policy beliefs, leading to heightened overestimation of the tax’s costs and reinforcing the erroneous perception that a progressive carbon tax is regressive. To quantify the role of these belief changes in explaining the observed decrease in support, I employ an instrumental variable approach, leveraging tailored information treatments within the survey as instruments. My preliminary analysis indicates that 30% of the reduction in support can be attributed to the pessimistic shifts in beliefs about the tax’s affordability and progressivity.
Hope to see you there!