Trust, Happiness, and Pro-Social Behavior
with Stefano Carattini
Review of Economics and Statistics, forthcoming
Abstract: This paper combines several large-scale surveys and empirical strategies to shed new light on the determinants of cooperative behavior. We provide evidence indicating that the level of trust maximizing subjective well-being tends to be above the income maximizing level. Higher trust is also linked to more cooperative and pro-social behaviors, including the private provision of global public goods such as climate change mitigation. Consistent with “warm glow” theories of pro-social behavior, our results indicate that individuals may enjoy being more cooperative than what would lead them to maximize income, which can be reflected in higher levels of subjective well-being.
Broadband Internet and Fact-Resistant Beliefs: The Case of Climate Change Skepticism
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Abstract: I explore the informational role of broadband internet in forming and spreading fact-resistant attitudes, specifically climate change skepticism. My approach uses fine-grained broadband quality data in the U.S. along with an identification strategy relying on terrain-induced variations in the cost of broadband deployment. Overall, the results indicate that better internet can encourage unwarranted skepticism, albeit only to a limited extent. Suggestive evidence is further consistent with middle-aged and more Republican-leaning segments of the population driving any negative overall impacts toward denialism, while younger and less conservative segments, if at all, tend to respond in the opposite way.
Lobbying in Disguise
with Stefano Carattini and Ulrich Matter
Algorithmic Radicalization on YouTube
with Ulrich Matter
Quo Vadis COP? Future Arrangements for Intergovernmental Meetings under the UNFCCC – Settled and Fit for Purpose
with Benito Müller, Jen Allan, and Luis Gomez-Echeverri
European Capacity Building Initiative Policy Report (2021). Covered by Carbon Brief, Inside Climate News, and the Financial Times.
This is my Rifle - On US Police Militarisation and Crime
University of St. Gallen School of Economics and Political Science Discussion Paper No. 2017 (2020).
Performance-Based Resource Allocation - A Cautionary Tale
with Benito Müller, Cameron Hepburn, and Sam Fankhauser
Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment Working Paper 338 (2020).
Economic Growth and Climate Change - Opportunities and Challenges on the Way to a Zero-Carbon Society
with Linus Mattauch, Moritz Schwarz, and Jan Siegmeier
Wirtschaftspolitische Blätter 03/2017 (2017).
Wirtschaftswachstum aufgeben? - Eine Analyse wachstumskritischer Argumente (EN: Give up on growth? An analysis of degrowth arguments)
with Franziska Funke, Frithjof Gressmann, Philipp Mathé, Michael Oberhaus, Johanna Joy Obst, and Daniel Weishaar
Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change (MCC) Working Paper 01/2016 (2016).