Externalities of Policy-Induced Scrappage: The Case of Automotive Regulations
Date and Time
10:00 am - 11:30 am EST
Location
Virtual Seminar
Washington, DC 20460
United States
Event Type
Description
Contact: Carl Pasurka, 202-566-2275 ([email protected])
Presenter: Akshaya Jha (Heinz College of Information Systems and Public Policy, Carnegie Mellon University)
Description: Many transportation policies indirectly affect aggregate vehicle travel and resulting externalities by inducing changes in vehicle scrappage rates. We estimate the effect of policy-induced changes in fleet size on fleet travel distance and gasoline consumption by leveraging the staggered removal of state safety inspection programs across the United States. Using difference-in-differences, we find that the removal of safety inspections causes a 3-4% increase in fleet size on average. Using an instrumental variables approach robust to weak instruments, our estimates suggest that the effects of fleet size on fleet travel and gasoline usage assumed in prior studies substantially overestimate the externality costs of delayed scrappage.
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