Exploring consistency between stated and revealed preferences for the plastic bag ban policy in Chile.

This paper exploits individual-level data before the implementation of a national policy to understand the factors driving avoidance of plastic consumption and explore potential inconsistencies between revealed and stated preferences for a plastic bag ban policy. We estimate a bivariate ordered probit model that allows us to account for a potential correlation between these types of preferences. The data reveals that while 71% of respondents take a reusable bag for shopping, only 58% of the sample state to strongly agree with prohibiting plastic bags. We find that gender, age, environmental concerns, environmental efforts, participation in environmental causes and pro-environmental behavior determine avoidance of plastic consumption, but no effects are found for being in favor of the prohibition. We also find inconsistencies decrease for individuals demonstrating higher pro-environmental behavior in related domains. This indicates waste management policies may benefit from local grounded knowledge from related environmental initiatives.

Using stated preference methods to design cost-effective subsidy programs to induce technology adoption: an application to a stove program in southern Chile.

We study the design of an economic incentive based program - a subsidy - to induce adoption of more efficient technology in a pollution reduction program in southern Chile. Stated preferences methods, contingent valuation (CV), and choice experiment (CE) are used to estimate the probability of adoption and the willingness to share the cost of a new technology by a household. The cost-effectiveness property of different subsidy schemes is explored numerically for different regulatory objectives. Our results suggest that households are willing to participate in voluntary programs and to contribute by paying a share of the cost of adopting more efficient technologies. We find that attributes of the existing and the new technology, beyond the price, are relevant determinant factors of the participation decision and payment. Limited access to credit markets for low income families can be a major barrier for an effective implementation of these types of programs. Variations in the design of the subsidy and on the regulator's objective and constraints can have significant impact on the level and the cost of reduction of aggregate emissions achieved.