IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jindec/v63y2015i2p249-278.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does Energy Consumption Respond to Price Shocks? Evidence from a Regression-Discontinuity Design

Author

Listed:
  • Paulo Bastos
  • Lucio Castro
  • Julian Cristia
  • Carlos Scartascini

Abstract

type="main"> We exploit unique features of a recently introduced tariff schedule for natural gas in Buenos Aires to estimate the short-run impact of price shocks on residential energy utilization. The schedule induces a non-linear and non-monotonic relationship between households' accumulated consumption and unit prices, thus generating exogenous price variation, which we exploit in a regression-discontinuity design. We find that a price increase causes a prompt and significant decline in gas consumption. The results also indicate that consumers respond more to recent past bills than to expected prices, which argues against an assumption of perfect awareness of complex price schedules by consumers.

Suggested Citation

  • Paulo Bastos & Lucio Castro & Julian Cristia & Carlos Scartascini, 2015. "Does Energy Consumption Respond to Price Shocks? Evidence from a Regression-Discontinuity Design," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 63(2), pages 249-278, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jindec:v:63:y:2015:i:2:p:249-278
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/joie.12074
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James B. Bushnell & Erin T. Mansur, 2005. "Consumption Under Noisy Price Signals: A Study Of Electricity Retail Rate Deregulation In San Diego," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(4), pages 493-513, December.
    2. Lucas W. Davis & Erich Muehlegger, 2010. "Do Americans consume too little natural gas? An empirical test of marginal cost pricing," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 41(4), pages 791-810, December.
    3. A. Colin Cameron & Jonah B. Gelbach & Douglas L. Miller, 2008. "Bootstrap-Based Improvements for Inference with Clustered Errors," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(3), pages 414-427, August.
    4. Koichiro Ito, 2014. "Do Consumers Respond to Marginal or Average Price? Evidence from Nonlinear Electricity Pricing," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(2), pages 537-563, February.
    5. Imbens, Guido W. & Lemieux, Thomas, 2008. "Regression discontinuity designs: A guide to practice," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 615-635, February.
    6. Michael Parti & Cynthia Parti, 1980. "The Total and Appliance-Specific Conditional Demand for Electricity in the Household Sector," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 11(1), pages 309-321, Spring.
    7. Lee, David S. & Card, David, 2008. "Regression discontinuity inference with specification error," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 655-674, February.
    8. Shin, Jeong-Shik, 1985. "Perception of Price When Price Information Is Costly: Evidence from Residential Electricity Demand," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 67(4), pages 591-598, November.
    9. Peter C. Reiss & Matthew W. White, 2008. "What changes energy consumption? Prices and public pressures," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 39(3), pages 636-663, September.
    10. Hausmann, J. A. & Kinnucan, M. & McFaddden, D., 1979. "A two-level electricity demand model : Evaluation of the connecticut time-of-day pricing test," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 263-289, August.
    11. Krichene, Noureddine, 2002. "World crude oil and natural gas: a demand and supply model," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 557-576, November.
    12. Carlo Fezzi & Derek Bunn, 2010. "Structural Analysis of Electricity Demand and Supply Interactions," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 72(6), pages 827-856, December.
    13. Parks, Richard W. & Weitzel, David, 1984. "Measuring the consumer welfare effects of time-differentiated electricity prices," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 26(1-2), pages 35-64.
    14. Dubin, Jeffrey A & McFadden, Daniel L, 1984. "An Econometric Analysis of Residential Electric Appliance Holdings and Consumption," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 52(2), pages 345-362, March.
    15. David S. Lee & Thomas Lemieux, 2010. "Regression Discontinuity Designs in Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(2), pages 281-355, June.
    16. Acton, Jan Paul, 1982. "An Evaluation of Economists' Influence on Electric Utility Rate Reforms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 72(2), pages 114-119, May.
    17. Lee, David S., 2008. "Randomized experiments from non-random selection in U.S. House elections," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 675-697, February.
    18. Caves, Douglas W. & Christensen, Laurits R., 1980. "Econometric analysis of residential time-of-use electricity pricing experiments," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 287-306, December.
    19. Liu, Lon-Mu & Lin, Maw-Wen, 1991. "Forecasting residential consumption of natural gas using monthly and quarterly time series," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 3-16, May.
    20. Joshua Angrist & Victor Lavy, 2009. "The Effects of High Stakes High School Achievement Awards: Evidence from a Randomized Trial," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1384-1414, September.
    21. McCrary, Justin, 2008. "Manipulation of the running variable in the regression discontinuity design: A density test," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 698-714, February.
    22. Peter C. Reiss & Matthew W. White, 2005. "Household Electricity Demand, Revisited," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 72(3), pages 853-883.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. W. D. Gregori, 2014. "Fiscal Rules and Public Spending: Evidence from Italian Municipalities," Working Papers wp923, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    2. Harpenau, Franziska & Magalhaes, Katrin Marques & Steffen, Nico & Wiewiorra, Lukas, 2023. "Saving behaviors of private households under varying tariff structures, price levels and incentives - Experimental evidence," WIK Working Papers 7, WIK Wissenschaftliches Institut für Infrastruktur und Kommunikationsdienste GmbH, Bad Honnef.
    3. Alberini,Anna & Umapathi,Nithin, 2021. "What Are the Benefits of Government Assistance with Household Energy Bills ? Evidence from Ukraine," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9669, The World Bank.
    4. Gerard, Francois, 2013. "What Changes Energy Consumption, and for How Long? New Evidence from the 2001 Brazilian Electricity Crisis," RFF Working Paper Series dp-13-06, Resources for the Future.
    5. Do,Quy-Toan & Jacoby,Hanan G., 2020. "Sophisticated Policy with Naive Agents : Habit Formation and Piped Water in Vietnam," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9207, The World Bank.
    6. Lennard Schlattmann, 2024. "Spatial Redistribution of Carbon Taxes," ECONtribute Discussion Papers Series 345, University of Bonn and University of Cologne, Germany.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Peter C. Reiss & Matthew W. White, 2008. "What changes energy consumption? Prices and public pressures," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 39(3), pages 636-663, September.
    2. Robert W. Hahn & Robert D. Metcalfe, 2021. "Efficiency and Equity Impacts of Energy Subsidies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(5), pages 1658-1688, May.
    3. Huber, Martin, 2019. "An introduction to flexible methods for policy evaluation," FSES Working Papers 504, Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences, University of Freiburg/Fribourg Switzerland.
    4. Li, Han & Li, Jiangyi & Lu, Yi & Xie, Huihua, 2020. "Housing wealth and labor supply: Evidence from a regression discontinuity design," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 183(C).
    5. Otávio Bartalotti, 2013. "Theory and Practice of Inference in Regression Discontinuity: A Fixed-Bandwidth Asymptotics Approach," Working Papers 1302, Tulane University, Department of Economics, revised Nov 2013.
    6. Joaquín Artés & Ignacio Jurado, 2018. "Government fragmentation and fiscal deficits: a regression discontinuity approach," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 175(3), pages 367-391, June.
    7. Paco Martorell & Damon Clark, 2010. "The Signaling Value of a High School Diploma," Working Papers 1248, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
    8. Mauricio Villamizar‐Villegas & Freddy A. Pinzon‐Puerto & Maria Alejandra Ruiz‐Sanchez, 2022. "A comprehensive history of regression discontinuity designs: An empirical survey of the last 60 years," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(4), pages 1130-1178, September.
    9. Markus Frölich & Martin Huber, 2019. "Including Covariates in the Regression Discontinuity Design," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(4), pages 736-748, October.
    10. Simona Bigerna and Carlo Andrea Bollino, 2015. "A System Of Hourly Demand in the Italian Electricity Market," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4).
    11. Boogen, Nina & Datta, Souvik & Filippini, Massimo, 2021. "Estimating residential electricity demand: New empirical evidence," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    12. Bart Cockx & Muriel Dejemeppe, 2010. "The Threat of Monitoring Job Search. A Discontinuity Design," CESifo Working Paper Series 3267, CESifo.
    13. Bahadır Dursun & Resul Cesur, 2016. "Transforming lives: the impact of compulsory schooling on hope and happiness," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 29(3), pages 911-956, July.
    14. Takahide Yanagi, 2014. "The Effect of Measurement Error in the Sharp Regression Discontinuity Design," KIER Working Papers 910, Kyoto University, Institute of Economic Research.
    15. Woo, C.K. & Sreedharan, P. & Hargreaves, J. & Kahrl, F. & Wang, J. & Horowitz, I., 2014. "A review of electricity product differentiation," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 262-272.
    16. Montoya, Ana Maria & Noton, Carlos & Solis, Alex, 2018. "The Returns to College Choice: Loans, Scholarships and Labor Outcomes," Working Paper Series 2018:12, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    17. Blaise Melly & Rafael Lalive, 2020. "Estimation, Inference, and Interpretation in the Regression Discontinuity Design," Diskussionsschriften dp2016, Universitaet Bern, Departement Volkswirtschaft.
    18. Yang He & Otávio Bartalotti, 2020. "Wild bootstrap for fuzzy regression discontinuity designs: obtaining robust bias-corrected confidence intervals," The Econometrics Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 23(2), pages 211-231.
    19. Koichiro Ito, 2014. "Do Consumers Respond to Marginal or Average Price? Evidence from Nonlinear Electricity Pricing," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(2), pages 537-563, February.
    20. Bartalotti Otávio, 2019. "Regression Discontinuity and Heteroskedasticity Robust Standard Errors: Evidence from a Fixed-Bandwidth Approximation," Journal of Econometric Methods, De Gruyter, vol. 8(1), pages 1-26, January.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • L95 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Transportation and Utilities - - - Gas Utilities; Pipelines; Water Utilities
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • L51 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Economics of Regulation
    • Q41 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - Demand and Supply; Prices
    • Q48 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - Government Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jindec:v:63:y:2015:i:2:p:249-278. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0022-1821 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.