Progress 10/01/08 to 09/30/13
Outputs
Target Audience: Most of my research output is targetted at other scientists and academics. However, I have endeavored to share my findings with policymakers and general community members via the popular press. During the reporting period, I shared my research findings in publications such as NBC News, The Atlantic, The Huffington Post, The Guardian, and the Austin American-Statesman. I also wrote up a summary of my findings for one of my project research questions - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures? - for ACCESS Magazine, a publication that reaches tens of thousands of transportation professionals and policymakers. It should be published in 2014. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?
Nothing Reported
How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?
Nothing Reported
What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Goal 1. N/A (goal completed prior to the 2013 reporting period). Goal 2. N/A (goal proved infeasible prior to the 2013 reporting period). Goal 3. Completed full assembly and cleaning of data set for analysis. Goal 4. The manuscript related to this goal was accepted for publication at the Review of Economic Studies - one of the very top general-interest economics journals - during the 2013 reporting period. This manuscript finds that being hit by a vehicle that is 1,000 pounds heavier generates a 40-50% increase in fatality risk. The results imply a total accident-related externality that exceeds the estimated social cost of U.S. carbon emissions and is equivalent to $136 billion annually. The findings thus suggest that European gas taxes may be much closer to optimal levels than the U.S. gas tax. Although it will not appear in print until 2014, the journal editor reported that reviewers already told him the paper "will become a standard reference in the literature."
Publications
- Type:
Journal Articles
Status:
Awaiting Publication
Year Published:
2014
Citation:
Anderson, ML and Auffhammer, M. Pounds That Kill: The External Costs of Vehicle Weight. Forthcoming, Review of Economic Studies.
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Progress 01/01/12 to 12/31/12
Outputs
OUTPUTS: The first research question - What are the benefits and costs of regulating restaurants in the context of obesity policy - has been completed, and the results have been widely disseminated. There was no output relating to the second research question - What are the effects of traffic congestion on the incidence of heart attacks - during the reporting period as we do not believe that it would be productive to continue with this study (see last accomplishments report). However, the initial work on this project has spawned an additional project measuring the impact of public transit on reducing traffic congestion. This project is generating results with major policy implications, and during this reporting period we presented it at two environmental conferences and seminars at UC Berkeley and Texas A&M. There was significant output relating to the third research question - Does long term exposure to air pollution affect mortality - during the reporting period. Using California mortality data, we previously mapped the location of each decedent's address, coded the decedent as upwind or downwind of a major highway, coded the location and demographic characteristics of every Census block in the Los Angeles area, and combined the two data sources. During this reporting period, we computed mortality rates for each Census block and began the analysis. Preliminary results suggest significant mortality effects of long-term air pollution exposure in some cases. There was also significant output relating to the fourth research question - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures - during the reporting period. We submitted our draft paper to one of the very top general interest economics journals, where it has been conditionally accepted. PARTICIPANTS: Not relevant to this project. TARGET AUDIENCES: Not relevant to this project. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
The spinoff of our second project has generated significant results: public transit provides much more congestion relief than previously believed, and it does so because it tends to draw riders from the most congested roads. As mentioned above, we have begun disseminating these results in conferences and seminars.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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Progress 01/01/11 to 12/31/11
Outputs
OUTPUTS: There was substantial output relating to the first research question - What are the benefits and costs of regulating restaurants in the context of obesity policy - during the reporting period. The paper was published at a general interest economics journal. There was no output relating to the second research question - What are the effects of traffic congestion on the incidence of heart attacks - during the reporting period as we do not believe that it would be productive to continue with this study (see last accomplishments report). However, the initial work on this project has spawned an additional project measuring the impact of public transit on reducing traffic congestion. This project is generating interesting results. There was significant output relating to the third research question - Does long term exposure to air pollution affect mortality - during the reporting period. Using California mortality data, we previously mapped the location of each decedent's address and coded the decedent as upwind or downwind of a major highway. During this reporting period, we coded the location and demographic characteristics of every Census block in the Los Angeles area. Combining the two data sources, we can now compute mortality rates for each Census block and proceed with the analysis. There was also significant output relating to the fourth research question - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures - during the reporting period. We completed a draft of our paper and submitted it to a general interest economics journal. We also presented these results at conferences or seminars at Stanford University, Cornell University, RAND, Seattle, the Tinbergen Institute (Amsterdam), and Erasmus University (Rotterdam). PARTICIPANTS: Not relevant to this project. TARGET AUDIENCES: Not relevant to this project. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
We generated significant findings with respect to our fourth research question - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures. We discovered that the optimal fuel tax should be $1-2 higher per gallon (100%-200% higher) than previously believed. This finding implies that aggressive fuel economy standards may be economically efficient even absent any concerns about climate change.
Publications
- Anderson, M., and Matsa, D. (2011) Are Restaurants Really Supersizing America American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 3(1): 152-188.
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Progress 01/01/10 to 12/31/10
Outputs
OUTPUTS: There was substantial output relating to the first research question - What are the benefits and costs of regulating restaurants in the context of obesity policy - during the reporting period. The paper was accepted for publication at a general interest economics journal after we made significant revisions and refinements. We also wrote a summary of the conclusions for a general audience and published them in the periodical "Regulation." This periodical has a wider distribution than most academic journals and has generated additional exposure of our work in the media. There was no output relating to the second research question - What are the effects of traffic congestion on the incidence of heart attacks - during the reporting period as we do not believe that it would be productive to continue with this study (see last accomplishments report). There was significant output relating to the third research question - Does long term exposure to air pollution affect mortality - during the reporting period. We obtained historical California mortality data with the address of residence for each decedent. We mapped the location of each decedent's address and coded the decedent as upwind or downwind of a major highway. We produced preliminary results comparing the average age of death for decedents living upwind versus downwind from the highway. There was also significant output relating to the fourth research question - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures - during the reporting period. We assembled and cleaned the state traffic accident data sets and produced a set of statistical analyses measuring the effect of vehicle weight on traffic fatalities using these data. We wrote these results into a paper that we are preparing for submission to a general interest economics journal. We also presented these results at several environmental and health economics conferences at Cornell University, Montreal, and University of California, Santa Barbara. PARTICIPANTS: Not relevant to this project. TARGET AUDIENCES: Not relevant to this project. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Not relevant to this project.
Impacts
We generated preliminary findings with respect to our third research question - Does long term exposure to air pollution affect mortality We discovered that people who live within one mile of a highway on the downwind side die approximately 100 days earlier than people who live within one mile of a highway on the upwind side. This difference appears to be statistically significant in our data. We generated further findings with respect to our fourth research question - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures We discovered that: (a) the preliminary findings using national data that we reported last period are replicated (with additional precision) when we use the much larger state data sets and (b) the relationship between striking vehicle weight and struck vehicle fatalities remains even when we use the number of occupants in the striking vehicle as an additional source of variation in striking vehicle weight. These additional findings make us very confident that the findings we reported last period represent causal affects.
Publications
- Anderson, M. and Matsa, D. (2010). Restaurants, Regulation, and the Supersizing of America, Regulation, 33(3): 40-47.
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Progress 01/01/09 to 12/31/09
Outputs
OUTPUTS: There was substantial output relating to the first research question - What are the benefits and costs of regulating restaurants in the context of obesity policy - during the reporting period. We completed a polished manuscript which we have submitted for publication at a general interest economics journal (where it currently has received a request for revision and resubmission). We presented our findings to audiences interested in health policy research, including the annual meetings of the American Economic Association and several large research universities. We publicized our findings to the media - articles summarizing our paper appeared in the Chicago Tribune, US News and World Report, and The Globe and Mail (the largest national circulation Canadian newspaper). There was less output relating to the second research question - What are the effects of traffic congestion on the incidence of heart attacks - during the reporting period. In particular, after a thorough set of analyses, we concluded that the available data are measured too poorly to generate reliable estimates. We thus do not believe that it would be responsible to continue with this study. There was significant output relating to the third research question - Does long term exposure to air pollution affect mortality - during the reporting period. We obtained historical California air quality data, mapped the location of all relevant pollution monitors, and began testing the validity of the research design. In particular, we tested whether we can detect significant differences in pollutant levels depending on whether a pollution monitor lies upwind or downwind from the highway. We are continuing this testing now, which is a requisite step before we estimate the effect of pollutant exposure on health outcomes.
There was also significant output relating to the fourth research question - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures - during the reporting period. We obtained all of the available state data sets for the study and have begun to clean and merge them. We also conducted a preliminary analysis using a smaller national data sets that confirms that our research design appears valid and has sufficient statistical power to detect significant effects. PARTICIPANTS: I added a graduate research assistant, Sikandra Christian (a graduate student in the UC Berkeley Agricultural and Resource Economics Department), to the third project (Does long term exposure to air pollution affect mortality). She has played a significant role in collecting and analyzing the air pollution data, under my direct supervision. TARGET AUDIENCES: Not relevant to this project. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: After a thorough set of analyses on our second project (What are the effects of traffic congestion on the incidence of heart attacks), we concluded that the available data are measured too poorly to generate reliable estimates. In particular, the correlations that we observed in the data between heart attacks and traffic congestion levels were highly unstable (depending on the specification) and noisily measured. We thus do not believe that it would be responsible to continue with this study, and we have returned the data to the California Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development.
Impacts
We generated preliminary findings with respect to our fourth research question - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures We discovered that: (a) adding an additional 1,000 pounds of weight to Vehicle A increases the probability of a fatality in Vehicle B by 40% when Vehicles A and B collide, (b) this relationship appears to represent a causal effect of weight rather than proxying for other unobserved factors that may be correlated with vehicle weight (such as driver behavior), and (c) the optimal gasoline tax that would "internalize" the estimated risks appears quite large (e.g., 70 cents per gallon or more).
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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Progress 01/01/08 to 12/31/08
Outputs
OUTPUTS: There was substantial output relating to the first research question - What are the benefits and costs of regulating restaurants in the context of obesity policy - during the reporting period. We obtained and analyzed an individual level data set containing information on subjects' weight, height, demographic characteristics, and location of residence. We also obtained and analyzed a ZIP code level data set containing information on restaurants. Combining these data sets, we estimated the effect of restaurants on obesity. We also collected original survey data to establish the link between restaurant proximity and frequency of consumption at restaurants. We presented our findings to audiences interested in health policy research, such as the National Bureau of Economic Research Summer Institute Health Economics workshop. We publicized our findings to the media - an article summarizing our initial findings appearing in Conde Nast Portfolio and was picked up by local newspapers around the country. There was also substantial output relating to the second research question - What are the effects of traffic congestion on the incidence of heart attacks - during the reporting period. We obtained and analyzed an individual level data set containing all heart attack admission at San Francisco Bay Area hospitals. We also obtained and analyzed a data set containing highway traffic speeds and highway incidents (accidents, stalled vehicles, etc.) during the study period. Combining these data sets, we produced preliminary estimates of the effect of traffic congestion on heart attacks. There was moderate output relating to the third research question - Does long term exposure to air pollution affect mortality - during the reporting period. We performed an extremely thorough literature review on the observed relationship between air pollutants and health and on the dispersal pattern of air pollutants near highways. This literature review has convinced us of the feasibility of the project and guided us n the project's design going forward.
There was also moderate output relating to the fourth research question - What are the total costs of fuel economy regulations or gasoline taxes after accounting for the fact that these policies correct other currently ignored market failures - during the reporting period. We have obtained a data set that includes the census of reported traffic accidents in two states, and we are working to obtain equivalent data sets in several other states. PARTICIPANTS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period. TARGET AUDIENCES: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
We generated findings with respect to our first research question - What are the benefits and costs of regulating restaurants in the context of obesity policy - and our second research question - What are the effects of traffic congestion on the incidence of heart attacks With respect to the first question, we discovered that: (a) towns located directly on Interstate highways are more likely to contain restaurants than towns that are 5 to 10 miles from Interstate highways, (b) the residents of towns located directly on Interstate highways thus consume approximately twice as much fast food as residents of towns that are 5 to 10 miles from Interstate highways, (c) increased consumption of restaurant food does not result in obesity, and (d) a primary reason why increased consumption of restaurant food does not increase weight is that individuals offset the extra calories that they eat at restaurant meals by eating less during other times of day. With respect to the second question, we discovered that accidents are correlated with heart attack admissions but only weakly correlated with traffic congestion.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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