The award-winning research addresses the role of social norms, individual preferences, and moral views in fighting climate change. The key finding of this experimental study: Many people contribute little to climate protection because they underestimate the willingness of others to fight global warming. Providing information on prevalent climate norms raises support for climate-friendly policies, particularly among climate-change skeptics [read more].
The second paper selected for the award, “Temperature, Workplace Safety, and Labor Market Inequality” by Jisung Park, Nora Pankratz and Patrick Behrer, illustrates that rising temperatures increase the risk of work injuries at both outdoor and indoor workplaces. Since low-wage earners are disproportionately affected, this may also exacerbate income inequality. This is a prime example of unexpected secondary effects of climate change that deserve further investigation [read more].
Worth 10,000 euros, the newly established IRECC Award recognizes important new insights into the broader, often underestimated consequences of climate change and the effects of environmental policies on society and the labor market. The inaugural IRECC winners “represent the best of modern applied-economics research,” according to the award committee made up of Susana Ferreira (University of Georgia), Andrew Oswald (University of Warwick, IZA) and Hilmar Schneider (IZA).