Individuals with a preference for keeping moral obligations may dislike learning that voluntary contributions are socially valuable: Such information can trigger unpleasant feelings of cognitive dissonance. I show that if initial beliefs about the social value of contributions are sufficiently...

Many consumers care about climate change and other externalities associated with their purchases. We analyze the behavior and market effects of such "socially responsible consumers" in three parts. First, we develop a flexible theoretical framework to study competitive equilibria with rational...

To reduce a negative externality, socially responsible households can invest responsibly (SRI), consume responsibly (SRC), or do both. Which is better? In a closed microeconomic model with intertwined product and capital markets, we analyze how responsible households should use SRI and SRC to...