The tradable or transferable permit system, “cap and trade”, is one of the most innovative policy options developed by environmental economists. Over the last 40 years, cap and trade programs have been used around the globe by some of the world’s biggest economies. By placing a cap on a...

The climate challenge requires ambitious climate policy. A sudden increase in carbon prices can lead to major shocks to the stock market. Some assets will lose part of their value, others all of it, and hence become “stranded”. If the markets are not ready to absorb the shock, a financial...

This paper studies the relationship between generalized trust, temperature fluctuations during the maize growing season, and international migration by asylum seekers. A priori generalized trust can be expected to have an ambiguous effect on migration. On the one hand, countries with higher...

Nudges and behavioral interventions have become a popular tool to stimulate prosocial behavior. Little is known, however, on how to design effective social interventions in contexts in which the descriptive norm is low, i.e. when a desirable behavior is only practiced by a minority within the...

This paper combines several large-scale surveys with different identification strategies to shed new light on the determinants of cooperative behavior. We provide evidence indicating that the well-being maximizing level of trust is above the income maximizing level. Higher trust is also linked...

We examine the relationship between contemporaneous fine particulate matter exposure and COVID-19 morbidity and mortality using an instrumental variable approach based on wind direction. Harnessing daily changes in county-level wind direction, we show that arguably exogenous fluctuations in...

The Conference of the Parties (COP) has proven a valuable outlet to advance the climate agenda. The combination of high media coverage, extremely high expectations set by influential environmentalists, and unanimity rules has, however, started to limit its effectiveness. Technical issues can...

Conflicting societal goals can lead to national and local policies that are at odds with each other. National policies promoting the adoption of solar photovoltaics may be counteracted by local policies defining the aesthetics of the built environment. As solar photovoltaic energy approaches...

Observability has been demonstrated to influence the adoption of pro-social behavior in a variety of contexts. This study implements a field experiment to examine the influence of observability in the context of a novel pro-social behavior: peer-to-peer solar. Peer-to-peer solar offers an...

Ambitious climate policy, coupled with financial frictions, has the potential to create macrofinancial stability risk. Such stability risk may expand beyond the economy implementing climate policy, potentially catching other countries off guard. International spillovers may occur because of...