New SNSF grant for Prof. Thomas Weber

Prof. Weber’s research project, entitled “A Framework for Empirical Nonmarket Valuation and Cash-Equivalent Welfare Assessment,” seeks to advance the data-driven valuation of the effects of welfare changes on individuals and society. Eliciting such values is of central importance to decision making, with and without risk. In contexts where welfare changes ought to be brought about by a nonmarket commodity such as a public good or environmental policy regarding, say, a change in the energy mix or additional pollution-abatement measures, the design of effective policies must rely on the availability of accurate valuations of the implied welfare change. Establishing the proper value-elicitation method is therefore essential. The research objective is to use recent insights about the nature of Hicksian welfare measures (Weber 2010, 2012) to further develop and test new methods for the valuation of state changes, from the perspective of an individual. This work contains a number of empirical experiments, notably two phases of laboratory trials and one field test. The funding period begins in 2013 and ends in 2015.

References:

1. Weber, T.A. (2012) “An Augmented Becker-DeGroot-Marschak Mechanism for Transaction Cycles,” Economics Letters, Vol. 114, No. 1, pp. 43—46.

2. Weber, T.A. (2010) “Hicksian Welfare Measures and the Normative Endowment Effect,” American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, Vol. 2, No. 4, pp. 171—194.