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Project Citation: 

Borenstein, Severin. Replication data for: The Redistributional Impact of Nonlinear Electricity Pricing. Nashville, TN: American Economic Association [publisher], 2012. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2019-10-13. https://doi.org/10.3886/E114795V1

Project Description

Summary:  View help for Summary Electricity regulators often mandate increasing-block pricing (IBP)—i.e., marginal price increases with the customer's average daily usage—to protect low-income households from rising costs. IBP has no cost basis, raising a classic conflict between efficiency and distributional goals. Combining household-level utility billing data with census data on income, I find that IBP in California results in modest wealth redistribution, but creates substantial deadweight loss relative to the transfers. I also show that a common approach to studying income distribution effects by using median household income within census block groups may be misleading. (JEL D31, L11, L51, L94, L98, Q41, Q48)

Scope of Project

JEL Classification:  View help for JEL Classification
      D31 Personal Income, Wealth, and Their Distributions
      L11 Production, Pricing, and Market Structure; Size Distribution of Firms
      L51 Economics of Regulation
      L94 Electric Utilities
      L98 Industry Studies: Utilities and Transportation: Government Policy
      Q41 Energy: Demand and Supply; Prices
      Q48 Energy: Government Policy


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