RESEARCH

Recent Papers

Bos, I., G. Maccarrone, Marco A. Marini (2024) "Anti-consumerism: Stick or Carrot" FEEM Working Paper 07.2024 (in submission).

Abstract: Anti-consumerism is a doctrine that aims to discourage excessive consumption because of its damaging effect on the environment. It can either focus on creating psychic costs for consumers (a ‘stick’) or psychic benefits for non-consumers (a ‘carrot’). This paper examines the impact of these two approaches on competition and welfare. The competitive effect is comparable in both cases – anti-consumerism (weakly) reduces competitive pressure as well as prices, outputs and profits. In terms of consumer and social welfare, however, the carrot performs strictly better than the stick.

M. A. Marini, S. Nocito (2023),"Climate Activism Favors Pro-environmental Consumption", FEEM Working Paper 024.2023 (under submission).

Abstract: We investigate whether climate activism favors pro-environmental consumption by examining the impact of Fridays for Future (FFF) protests in Italy on second-hand automobile transactions in the strike-affected areas. Leveraging data on 10 million automobile transactions occurring before and after FFF, we exploit rainfall on the day of the events as exogenous source of attendance variation. Our findings reveal that local participation to the events is associated with a reduction in the per capita CO2 emissions of pur- chased cars, an uptick in the market share of low-emission vehicles and a corresponding decrease in the market share of high-emission counterparts. Notably, we uncover heterogeneous effects across gender and age groups. Results are primarily driven by a rise in the purchase of petrol cars, with electric cars contributing to a lesser extent, thereby displacing the demand for diesel vehicles. This evidence indicates substitution effects between goods prospectively subject to more stringent environmental regulations toward those obeying milder restrictions. The study provides valuable insights into the mechanisms underlying individuals’ consumption choices under the influence of social protests.

Cirulli, V., M. A. Marini, G. Marini, O.R. Straume (2023) "Do Hospital Mergers Reduce Waiting Times? Theory and Evidence from the English NHS", FEEM Working Paper 014-2023 (in submission)

Abstract: We analyse--theoretically and empirically--the effect of hospital mergers on waiting times in healthcare markets where prices are fixed. Using a spatial modelling framework where patients choose a provider based on traveling distance and waiting times, we show that the effect is theoretically ambiguous. In the presence of cost ynergies, the scope for lower waiting times as a result of the merger is larger if the hospitals are more profit-oriented. This result is arguably confirmed by our empirical analysis, which is based on a conditional flexible difference-in-differences methodology applied to a long panel of data on hospital mergers in the English NHS, where we find that the effects of a merger on waiting times crucially rely on a legal status that can reasonably be linked to the degree of profit-orientation.

Maccarrone, G., M. A. Marini, O. Tarola (2023) "Shop Until You Drop: the Unexpected Effects of Anti-hedonism and Environmentalism", DISSE WP, 01/2023 (in submission).

Abstract: In an economy where consumers have heterogeneous preferences over the hedonic and environmental attributes of goods on sale, we explore the effects of anti-consumerism and environmentalism. We show that when the environmental attributes of products come at the expense of the hedonic attributes, a higher supply of anti-consumerism and environmentalism yields the expected positive effect on the environment. In contrast, when hedonic and environmental attributes are jointly met by a good, higher levels of anti-consumerism and environmentalism negatively affect the society's environmental footprint. Moreover, the welfare impact of anti-consumerism and environmentalism is far from being obvious, giving rise to unexpected redistributive effects between firms and consumers.

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