[go: up one dir, main page]

IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jaerec/doi10.1086-691688.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Fuel Prices, New Vehicle Fuel Economy, and Implications for Attribute-Based Standards

Author

Listed:
  • Benjamin Leard
  • Joshua Linn
  • Virginia McConnell
Abstract
Energy efficiency standards based on product attributes may interact with market conditions and affect the overall stringency of the standards. In this paper we analyze the interaction between gasoline prices and the redesigned and tightened federal fuel economy standards. Tightened standards tend to reduce the effect of gasoline prices on market shares. Furthermore, under the standards a vehicle’s fuel economy requirement depends on its size. Lower gasoline prices incentivize consumers to purchase new vehicles with lower fuel economy, which are typically larger and therefore face lower fuel economy requirements. Using monthly data from 1996 to 2015, we find that fuel prices have had a smaller effect on market shares in recent years than previously. This result appears to be driven by a stronger response to rising than falling or stable prices. We construct two proxies for the stringency of the standards, and we find limited evidence that the standards affect the relationship between fuel prices and market shares. Using the estimated responsiveness to fuel costs from the 2008–15 period, the estimates imply that the 25% gasoline price decrease between 2014 and 2015 had a modest effect on average fuel economy and the average fuel economy required by the standards.

Suggested Citation

  • Benjamin Leard & Joshua Linn & Virginia McConnell, 2017. "Fuel Prices, New Vehicle Fuel Economy, and Implications for Attribute-Based Standards," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 4(3), pages 659-700.
  • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jaerec:doi:10.1086/691688
    DOI: 10.1086/691688
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/691688
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/691688
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/691688?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Arik Levinson, 2019. "Energy Efficiency Standards Are More Regressive Than Energy Taxes: Theory and Evidence," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 6(S1), pages 7-36.
    2. Kellogg, Ryan, 2020. "Output and attribute-based carbon regulation under uncertainty," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 190(C).
    3. Yujie Lin & Joshua Linn, 2023. "Environmental Regulation and Product Attributes: The Case of European Passenger Vehicle Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 10(1), pages 1-32.
    4. Linn, Joshua & McConnell, Virginia, 2019. "Interactions between federal and state policies for reducing vehicle emissions," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 507-517.
    5. Pessoa, Joao Paulo & Santos, Roberto Amaral & Chimeli, Ariaster, 2023. "Natural Gas Vehicles: Consequences to Fuel Markets and the Environment," SocArXiv 7tvgy, Center for Open Science.
    6. Leard, Benjamin & Linn, Joshua & Springel, Katalin, 2019. "Pass-Through and Welfare Effects of Regulations that Affect Product Attributes," RFF Working Paper Series 19-07, Resources for the Future.
    7. Piotr Wróblewski & Wojciech Drożdż & Wojciech Lewicki & Jakub Dowejko, 2021. "Total Cost of Ownership and Its Potential Consequences for the Development of the Hydrogen Fuel Cell Powered Vehicle Market in Poland," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(8), pages 1-25, April.
    8. Doremus, Jacqueline & Helfand, Gloria & Liu, Changzheng & Donahue, Marie & Kahan, Ari & Shelby, Michael, 2019. "Simpler is better: Predicting consumer vehicle purchases in the short run," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 1404-1415.
    9. Asadi, Mehrad & Balcilar, Mehmet & Sheikh, Umaid A. & Roubaud, David & Ghasemi, Hamid Reza, 2023. "Are there inextricable connections among automobile stocks, crude oil, steel, and the US dollar?," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    10. Sheldon, Tamara L. & Dua, Rubal, 2021. "How responsive is Saudi new vehicle fleet fuel economy to fuel-and vehicle-price policy levers?," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    11. Tikoudis, Ioannis & Mebiame, Rose Mba & Oueslati, Walid, 2023. "Projecting the fuel efficiency of conventional vehicles: CAFE regulations, gasoline taxes and autonomous technical change," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 183(C).
    12. Beaudoin, Justin & Chen, Yuan & Heres, David R. & Kheiravar, Khaled H. & Lade, Gabriel E. & Yi, Fujin & Zhang, Wei & Lin Lawell, C.-Y. Cynthia, 2018. "Environmental Policies in the Transportation Sector: Taxes, Subsidies, Mandates, Restrictions, and Investment," ISU General Staff Papers 201808150700001050, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    13. Jain, Prachi & Maitra, Debasish & Kang, Sang Hoon, 2023. "Oil price and the automobile industry: Dynamic connectedness and portfolio implications with downside risk," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    14. Rajesh Sharma & Pradeep Kautish & D. Suresh Kumar, 2021. "Assessing Dynamism of Crude Oil Demand in Middle-Income Countries of South Asia: A Panel Data Investigation," Global Business Review, International Management Institute, vol. 22(1), pages 169-183, February.
    15. Rik L. Rozendaal & Herman R. J. Vollebergh, 2021. "Policy-Induced Innovation in Clean Technologies: Evidence from the Car Market," CESifo Working Paper Series 9422, CESifo.
    16. Roberto Amaral-Santos & Ariaster Chimeli & Joao Paulo Pessoa, 2023. "Natural Gas Vehicles: Consequences to Fuel Markets and the Environment," Working Papers, Department of Economics 2023_07, University of São Paulo (FEA-USP).
    17. Kellogg, Ryan, 2018. "Gasoline price uncertainty and the design of fuel economy standards," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 160(C), pages 14-32.
    18. Piotr Wróblewski & Wojciech Lewicki, 2021. "A Method of Analyzing the Residual Values of Low-Emission Vehicles Based on a Selected Expert Method Taking into Account Stochastic Operational Parameters," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(21), pages 1-24, October.
    19. Leard, Benjamin, 2019. "Estimating Consumer Substitution Between New and Used Passenger Vehicles," RFF Working Paper Series 19-01, Resources for the Future.
    20. Leard, Benjamin & Linn, Joshua & Springel, Katalin, 2023. "Vehicle Attribute Tradeoffs and the Distributional Effects of US Fuel Economy and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards," RFF Working Paper Series 23-04, Resources for the Future.
    21. Malina, Christiane, 2016. "The environmental impact of vehicle circulation tax reform in Germany," CAWM Discussion Papers 86, University of Münster, Münster Center for Economic Policy (MEP).
    22. Wang, Yiwei & Miao, Qing, 2021. "The impact of the corporate average fuel economy standards on technological changes in automobile fuel efficiency," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • L62 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Manufacturing - - - Automobiles; Other Transportation Equipment; Related Parts and Equipment
    • Q4 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy
    • Q5 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ucp:jaerec:doi:10.1086/691688. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Journals Division (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JAERE .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.