Between and within vehicle models hedonic analyses of environmental attributes: the case of the Italian used-car market

To achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, the transportation sector must radically reduce its greenhouse gas emissions (GHGEs) emissions. According to earlier research, a growth of the market share of the used car market and an expansion of the lifetime of second-hand vehicles can play a crucial role in preventing a considerable amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. So, the purpose of this paper is to estimate, through a series of hedonic pricing models (HPMs), the consumers’ marginal willingness to pay (MWTP) for three environmental attributes of used cars: their level of fuel efficiency, their level of CO2 emissions, and their belonging to one of the European emission categories. To perform this analysis, two original cross-sectional datasets (the Panda and the Milan ones) were created through a scraping process of the used cars’ listings contained in the Italian version of the AutoScout24’s online advertising platform. Despite its several limitations, the implications that can be derived from this work, which has estimated a relevant consumers' MWTP for vehicles that have an improved fuel efficiency - especially in the Milan HPMs - and that comply with the highest European emission standards, and a very small or even negative MWTP for cars’ with a reduced level of CO2 emissions, is a support for higher investments in policies that will encourage the purchases of used cars with a high degree of these environmental features and, at the same time, the dismantling of the oldest and most polluting vehicles of the national fleet.