Automatically Green: Behavioral Economics and Environmental Protection

By Cass R. Sunstein, L. Reisch. 2013

229 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Careful attention to choice architecture promises to open up new possibilities for environmental protection – possibilities that go well beyond, and that may be more effective than, the standard tools of economic incentives, mandates, and bans. How, for example, do consumers choose between environmentally-friendly products or services and alternatives that are potentially damaging to the environment but less expensive? The answer may well depend on the default rule. Indeed, green default rules may well be a more effective tool for altering outcomes than large economic incentives. The underlying reasons include the power of suggestion; inertia and procrastination; and loss aversion. If well-chosen, green defaults are likely to have large effects in reducing the economic and environmental harms associated with various products and activities. Such defaults may or may not be more expensive to consumers. In deciding whether to establish green defaults, choice architects should consider both consumer welfare and a wide range of other costs and benefits. Sometimes that assessment will argue strongly in favor of green defaults, particularly when both economic and environmental considerations point in their direction. But when choice architects lack relevant information, when interest-group maneuvering is a potential problem, and when externalities are not likely to be significant, active choosing, perhaps accompanied by various influences (including provision of relevant information), will usually be preferable to a green default.

Subfields: Economics and Econometrics, Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law, Marketing

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/b19a8bdd98943517a28f6871a546add144c80253

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Citations in the corpus

Behavioral Environmental Economics: Promises and Challenges (2014, background): “Sunstein and Reisch (2013) provide several other examples of defaults in the context of green energy, paper savings and smart grids.”
Should Governments Invest More in Nudging? (2017, unknown): “To be sure, nudges can help even there, and sometimes they may be preferable (Sunstein and Reisch, 2014).”
Green nudges: Do they work? Are they ethical? (2016, background): “35 The general lesson isworth noting: “If environmentalists lament the fact that fewpeople are choosing green energy, they may aggravate the problem by drawing attention to, and thus reinforcing, a social norm that they hope to change” (Sunstein and Reisch, 2014: 129).”
Transforming Consumption: From Decoupling, to Behavior Change, to System Changes for Sustainable Consumption (2015, background): “Creating a sustainable default option can effectively utilize status quo bias (where people prefer to buy the “normal” product) (92, 105, 106), without restricting choice—a key goal of policymakers.”
Nudges that fail (2017, background): “To complete Hirschman’s trilogy, nudges may also jeopardize other important goals, as when a nudge, designed to reduce pollution, ends up increasing energy costs for the most disadvantaged members of society (Sunstein & Reisch, 2013).”
Mitigating climate change via food consumption and food waste: A systematic map of behavioral interventions (2020, methodology): “While these encompass the classical instruments such as consumer information and education, taxes and regulation, our interest lies in a new kind of policy tool, so-called behaviorally informed policies (e.g., Sunstein, 2014a).”