Ashton Pallottini
Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics, University of Chicago
Phone +1 616-581-5482
Email ashtonp@uchicago.edu
LinkedIn • GitHub • Twitter
Welcome! I am a Ph.D. candidate in the Kenneth C. Griffin Department of Economics at University of Chicago. I study questions in environmental economics and public economics. Often, my research in these fields draws on tools from behavioral economics.
Research
Working Papers
Paper or Plastic: Impacts to Consumers from Eco-labeling
Many lawmakers and environmental groups have argued in favor of carbon labeling on goods. We analyze the impacts to consumers from carbon labeling single-use cups using two randomized experiments. We document that carbon labels increase consumer knowledge of carbon but decrease knowledge of 'wastefulness.' We observe significant changes to consumer behavior tied to carbon labels but not to labels of both carbon and waste. Our estimates suggest this is mainly driven by salience. Overall, results suggest that carbon labeling influences consumers through more than just providing carbon information, which suggests greater care may be necessary when implementing future labels.
Selected Work-in-Progress
Onset of Offsets: The Evolution of Social Rewards in Demand for Carbon Mitigation
This paper provides the first estimates of how willingness-to-pay (WTP) for the ability to socially signal evolves as visible goods evolve from nascent to commonplace. These findings are in turn used to estimate dynamic optimal subsidies for carbon mitigation. Leveraging experimental variation in price, publicity, and good market penetration, I find that social signaling increases WTP for carbon mitigation by 87% for goods that are seen as having near-0% market penetration. This effect dissipates quickly, dropping below 15% for market penetrations of 12% and greater. Using a structural model, I show that subsidies for electric vehicles should consequently be set 33% lower at a market penetration of 0.5% than for a market penetration of 50%. Such findings highlight the importance of demand-side considerations in determining optimal subsidy dynamics for publicly visible environmental goods like electric vehicles, residential solar panels, and heat pumps.
Changing Gears: How Elon Musk’s Political Views Influence Tesla Demand
With Sofia Shchukina
We examine how the ideology associated with a good influences consumer demand. We show that Elon Musk's 2022 acquisition of Twitter decreased Tesla EV market share by 6.0 percentage points in liberal ZIP codes. Similarly, Musk's 2024 endorsement of Donald Trump increased Tesla EV market share by 4.7 percentage points in conservative ZIP codes. As a result, energy-related EV emissions increased by 18% in liberal ZIP codes and decreased by 8% in conservative ZIP codes. Our findings highlight the increasing importance of ideology in driving consumer demand, often coming at the expense of other desirable good qualities.
EV or not EV: How Motivated Reasoning Drives Demand for Electric Vehicles
With Sofia Shchukina
We examine the extent to which motivated reasoning drives demand for electric vehicles (EVs) via consumers holding inaccurate beliefs about environmental impact. In a novel experiment, we show that consumers hold inaccurate beliefs about EV impacts that are related to their political ideology. Liberals overestimate the societal benefits of EVs, whereas many conservatives underestimate the benefits of EVs. We show that the opposite holds for Tesla, a brand which tends to be associated with conservative ideology. We find further that individuals with inaccurate pro-EV or anti-EV beliefs tend to strategically avoid information on the true impacts of EVs. In line with a model of motivated reasoning, we demonstrate that giving individuals a 'cover' highlighting the non-emissions characteristics of EVs eliminates this WTP gap and enhances belief updating upon seeing information on true impacts. Combining this with detailed sales data, we estimate the extent to which motivated reasoning drives demand for EVs.
A Pipe Dream: Urban Drought Risk and Willingness-to-pay for Piped Water
With Jun Wong and Emma Zhang
Cities across the world rely on both private groundwater and piped water to meet demand. We examine the impacts of increasing urban groundwater drought risk on hedonic willingness-to-pay (WTP) for such piped water in Bangalore, India. Prior to the drought, residents had zero WTP for piped water over groundwater and bottled substitutes. Following the drought, residents' WTP to be 0.1km closer to the formal water pipe network permanently increased to 0.3-0.4% of monthly rents. This WTP is particularly high (0.5%) for larger units with multiple bedrooms, highlighting disproportionate impacts of droughts on families. We examine the consequential impact of rising drought risk on suburban apartment construction. Our findings highlight the role of drought risk in mitigating outwards suburban expansion in the Global South.
Slimmer at the Waste: Weighing Down Methane in the Presence of Informal Labor
With Jun Wong, Yixin Sun, and Emma Zhang
​We investigate the role of informal and formal workers in governing methane emissions from unsegregated waste in Delhi, India. We randomly provide incentive pay for segregated waste either to (i) formal collectors only or (ii) both formal and informal collectors. Using rich route-level collection data, we examine the extent to which incentive pay passes through to households. Comparing treatment (i) to (ii), we determine the magnitude of spillovers from households that switch to informal collection when only formal workers receive incentive pay. Finally, we estimate hysteresis in the effect of temporary incentive pay on long-term habit formation of both households and workers.
Teaching
University of Chicago
ECON 11600: Experimental Design (Undergraduate)
Winter 2024: Teaching Assistant reporting to Fulya Ersoy
ECON 21020: Econometrics (Undergraduate)
Spring 2023: Teaching Assistant reporting to Murilo Ramos
ECON 41120: Topics in Behavioral Economics (Ph.D.)
Winter 2023: Teaching Assistant reporting to Leonardo Bursztyn
ECON 20010: Elements of Economic Analysis I Honors (Undergraduate)
Fall 2022: Teaching Assistant reporting to Victor Lima
BUSN 33801: Microeconomics (EMBA)
Fall 2022 and Fall 2023: Teaching Assistant reporting to Lars Stole
Michigan State University
STT 200: Statistical Methods (Undergraduate)
Summer 2020: Fixed Term Instructor reporting to Camille Fairbourn
Fall 2019 - Spring 2020: Teaching Assistant reporting to Harish Sankaranarayanan
Personal
Weightlifting
Voted "Most Likely to be Bumped Into at the Conference Hotel's Gym At Strange Hours," I have made a habit of picking up heavy things and promptly setting them back down. Scientists hypothesize that one day this process will be automated and I can live my life like a person in Wall-E. Until that date, I bravely venture forth to the squat rack.
Reading
Most economists spend their time in a Ph.D. program reading Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, and even Karl Marx. I, on the other hand, have spent the last few years becoming a fantasy novel aficionado. Ask me about my experience reading Wheel of Time during my first year core sequence (spoiler alert: oof)! Want to know how I think different fantasy books stack up? Check out my Goodreads here!
Language
Ever met a tone-deaf person that can speak Chinese? No? Well, you still have not! But I am certainly working on it. Picking up (Mandarin) Chinese is proving to be incredibly challenging, but with great rewards. My goal is to be proficient by the time I go on the job market, and I am making good progress on Duolingo (thanks in large part to the owl's ominous demeanor). I am also planning on soon picking up where I left off with Spanish in my high school days. My days of monolingualism are numbered!
Sports
My one true passion! As a Pittsburgh Steelers fan, I am currently thinking up economic models to prove once and for all that TJ Watt is better than Myles Garrett. In the mean-time, I will continue to vicariously relive Steve Nash's glory days by wearing a headband every time I play pickup basketball.