Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Nudging out support for a carbon tax

Nature Climate Change volume 9, pages 484–489 (2019)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

A carbon tax is widely accepted as the most effective policy for curbing carbon emissions but is controversial because it imposes costs on consumers. An alternative, ‘nudge,’ approach promises smaller benefits but with much lower costs. However, nudges aimed at reducing carbon emissions could have a pernicious indirect effect if they offer the promise of a ‘quick fix’ and thereby undermine support for policies of greater impact. Across six experiments, including one conducted with individuals involved in policymaking, we show that introducing a green energy default nudge diminishes support for a carbon tax. We propose that nudges decrease support for substantive policies by providing false hope that problems can be tackled without imposing considerable costs. Consistent with this account, we show that by minimizing the perceived economic cost of the tax and disclosing the small impact of the nudge, eliminates crowding-out without diminishing support for the nudge.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Get just this article for as long as you need it

$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Introducing a green energy nudge reduces support for a carbon tax.
Fig. 2: Support for a carbon tax in the presence of a related or unrelated nudge in Study 2.
Fig. 3: Effect of nudge option on tax support across policy domains in Study 3.
Fig. 4: Support for carbon tax and green energy nudge in Study 4.

Data availability

The raw data from all our experiments and statistical code for all analyses and figures reported in the paper and the supplementary information are available via the Open Science Framework at: https://osf.io/w4u5q/.

References

  1. Allcott, H. Social norms and energy conservation. J. Public Econ. 95, 1082–1095 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Hedlin, S. & Sunstein, C. Does active choosing promote green energy use? Experimental evidence. Ecol. Law Q. 43, 107–141 (2016).

    Google Scholar 

  3. Benartzi, S. et al. Should governments invest more in nudging? Psychol. Sci. 28, 1041–1055 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Camerer, C., Issacharoff, S., Loewenstein, G., O’Donoghue, T. & Rabin, M. Regulation for conservatives: behavioral economics and the case for ‘asymmetric paternalism’. Univ. Pa. Law Rev. 151, 1211–1254 (2003).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Hall, M. G. et al. Public support for pictorial warnings on cigarette packs: an experimental study of US smokers. J. Behav. Med. 41, 398–405 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Thaler, R. H. & Sunstein, C. R. Libertarian paternalism. Am. Econ. Rev. 93, 175–179 (2003).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Thaler, R. H. & Sunstein, C. R. Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness (Yale Univ. Press, 2008).

  8. Allcott, H. & Rogers, T. The short-run and long-run effects of behavioral interventions: experimental evidence from energy conservation. Am. Econ. Rev. 104, 3003–3037 (2014).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Yoeli, E. et al. Behavioral science tools to strengthen energy & environmental policy. Behav. Sci. Policy 3, 68–79 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Loewenstein, G. & Chater, N. Putting nudges in perspective. Behav. Public Policy 1, 26–53 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Marteau, T. M., Ogilvie, D., Roland, M., Suhrcke, M. & Kelly, M. P. Judging nudging: can nudging improve population health? BMJ 342, d228–d228 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Levitt, S. D., List, J. A., Neckermann, S. & Sadoff, S. The behavioralist goes to school: leveraging behavioral economics to improve educational performance. Am. Econ. J. Econ. Policy 8, 183–219 (2016).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Madrian, B. C. et al. Behaviorally informed policies for household financial decisionmaking. Behav. Sci. Policy 3, 26–40 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Thaler, R. H. & Benartzi, S. Save more tomorrow: using behavioral economics to increase employee saving. J. Polit. Econ. 112, S164–S187 (2004).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Rogers, T. & Feller, A. Reducing student absences at scale by targeting parents' misbeliefs. Nat. Hum. Behav. 12, 335–342 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Nash, N. et al. Climate-relevant behavioral spillover and the potential contribution of social practice theory. WIREs Clim. Change 8, e481 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Thøgersen, J. Spillover processes in the development of a sustainable consumption pattern. J. Econ. Psychol. 20, 53–81 (1999).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Truelove, H. B., Carrico, A. R., Weber, E. U., Raimi, K. T. & Vandenbergh, M. P. Positive and negative spillover of pro-environmental behavior: an integrative review and theoretical framework. Glob. Environ. Change 29, 127–138 (2014).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Meijers, M. H. C., Verlegh, P. W. J., Noordewier, M. K. & Smit, E. G. The dark side of donating: how donating may license environmentally unfriendly behavior. Soc. Influ. 10, 250–263 (2015).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Tiefenbeck, V., Staake, T., Roth, K. & Sachs, O. For better or for worse? Empirical evidence of moral licensing in a behavioral energy conservation campaign. Energy Policy 57, 160–171 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Werfel, S. H. Household behaviour crowds out support for climate change policy when sufficient progress is perceived. Nat. Clim. Change 7, 512–515 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Fishbach, A., Dhar, R. & Zhang, Y. Subgoals as substitutes or complements: the role of goal accessibility. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 91, 232–242 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Loewenstein, G. & Ubel, P. Economics behaving badly. The New York Times A31 (15 July 2010).

  24. Loewenstein, G. et al. A behavioral blueprint for improving health care policy. Behav. Sci. Policy 3, 53–66 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Sunstein, C. R. Do people like nudges? SSRN https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2604084 (2016).

  26. Interagency Working Group on Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases. Technical Update on the Social Cost of Carbon for Regulatory Impact Analysis—Under Executive Order 12866 (Office of Management and Budget, 2013).

  27. Weber, E. in Psychological Perspectives to Environmental and Ethical Issues in Management (eds Bazerman, M., Messick, D., Tensbrunsel, A. & Wade-Benzoni, K.) 314–341 (Jossey-Bass, 1997).

  28. Hansen, J., Marx, S. & Weber, E. The Role of Climate Change Perceptions, Expectations, and Forecasts in Farmer Decision Making: The Argentine Pampas and South Florida (International Research Institute for Climate Prediction, 2004).

  29. Campbell, T. H. & Kay, A. C. Solution aversion: on the relation between ideology and motivated disbelief. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 107, 809–824 (2014).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  30. Tannenbaum, D., Fox, C. R. & Rogers, T. On the misplaced politics of behavioural policy interventions. Nat. Hum. Behav. 1, 0130 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  31. Davidai, S. & Shafir, E. Are ‘nudges’ getting a fair shot? Joint versus separate evaluation. Behav. Public Policy https://doi.org/10.1017/bpp.2018.9 (2018).

  32. Reisch, L. A. & Sunstein, C. R. Do Europeans like nudges? SSRN Electron. J. 11, 310–325 (2016).

    Google Scholar 

  33. Dolan, P. & Galizzi, M. M. Like ripples on a pond: behavioral spillovers and their implications for research and policy. J. Econ. Psychol. 47, 1–16 (2015).

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We thank R. Thaler and C. Sunstein for helpful comments and discussions. D.H. is grateful for funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation’s Doc.Mobility fellowship.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Social and Decision Sciences, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    David Hagmann & George Loewenstein

  2. Department of Psychology, Fordham University, New York, NY, USA

    Emily H Ho

Authors
  1. David Hagmann
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Emily H Ho
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. George Loewenstein
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

All authors contributed equally to the development of the ideas and authoring of the paper. D.H. implemented the surveys and managed the data collection. E.H. performed the statistical analyses and D.H. assisted.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to David Hagmann.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Journal peer review information: Nature Climate Change thanks M. Galizzi, A. Maki and S. Werfel for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

Publisher’s note: Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary Tables 1–12, Supplementary Notes 1–7, Supplementary Figures 1–9, Supplementary References and Supplementary Methods.

Reporting Summary

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Hagmann, D., Ho, E.H. & Loewenstein, G. Nudging out support for a carbon tax. Nat. Clim. Chang. 9, 484–489 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-019-0474-0

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-019-0474-0

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing