This article presents experimental tests of a linear and a nonlinear ambient tax mechanism that involve modest information requirements for the regulator. When agents are not allowed to communicate, both tax mechanisms result in emission levels that approximate the social optimum. When agents...

This article considers whether communication can improve the efficacy of incentive mechanisms designed to correct the problem of moral hazard in groups. In particular, we use experimental economics methods to study environmental targeting instruments proposed by Segerson (1988) for regulating a...

In this paper we summarize the theoretical arguments of Carson and Groves, et al., and assemble early empirical evidence that comports with this theoretical framework. In doing so, we argue that redefining criterion validity in terms of consequentiality offers the potential for a fundamental...

This paper uses laboratory experiments to provide primary empirical evidence on dynamic pollution tax policies. In particular, we investigate a setting where a regulator with incomplete information uses a pollution tax mechanism with a simple, endogenous tax rate adjustment rule to...

In this working paper we demonstrate that some of the statistical tests used by Huang and Smith in a recent Land Economics article (74(2 1998): 186-202) were erroneous, and raise concerns about their corresponding conclusions. Specifically, using data from one of the studies that they showcase,...

Two methods for calibrating discrete choice contingent valuation responses – the dichotomous choice with followup certainty question method of Champ et al. (1997) and the multiple bounded method of Welsh and Poe (1998) – are evaluated using data from a field validity comparison of...