Simon Disque — PhD Student in Economics — ETH Zürich
M.Sc. from London School of Economics | B.Sc. from Goethe University Frankfurt
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I am trying to understand how we can align public policies better to population preferences by studying:
Time preferences (i.e. social discounting)
Substitutability preferences
between consumption and the environmentThe aggregation of economic preferences
… mostly using decision experiments, supplemented with observational data and applied theory.
Reach out if you want to learn more or just want to chat about anything related and unrelated!
Meet me here:
06/2026:
7th WCERE, Lisbon
06/2026:
SURED 2026, Monte Verità
03/2026:
X4E Workshop, Augsburg
Selected Work in Progress
Selected Work in Progress
Heterogeneous Substitutability Preferences — R&R at The Economic Journal
(with M. A. Drupp, J. N. Meya and B. Bos)
Abstract:
We study the heterogeneity in preferences regarding the limited substitutability of environmental public goods versus private consumption and how it affects the economic value of nature. We show theoretically how mean marginal willingness to pay (WTP) depends on the distribution of complementarity preferences, and that it increases in preference heterogeneity. We provide a sufficient statistic for the contribution of preference heterogeneity to mean WTP and derive heterogeneity-equivalent representative agent preferences. We subsequently introduce an experimental framework to elicit individual-level complementarity preferences directly, applying it to incentivized and hypothetical trade-offs between market goods and forest ecosystem services. Estimating preference parameters for a large general population sample, we document substantial preference heterogeneity. The majority of estimates imply a preference for complementarity, with a median elasticity of complementarity of around 2.5, and a heavy long tail. We illustrate how accounting for the heterogeneity in complementarity preferences may considerably increase the economic value of nature.
Public Preferences for Index Aggregation Imply Lower Ocean Sustainability
(with B. Bos and M. A. Drupp)
Abstract:
Sustainability indices are essential to track development progress and guide policy. They often aggregate diverse dimensions into a composite index, requiring value-based choices about the importance of each dimension (weighting) and the extent to which weaknesses in some area can be offset by strengths in others (substitutability). Such choices strongly shape indices but lack empirical support. We introduce a preference-elicitation experiment to align aggregation choices with stakeholder views and apply it to the Ocean Health Index (OHI). Respondents from twelve coastal countries predominantly view OHI goals as complementary, challenging current assumptions of perfect substitutability. Incorporating these public preferences yields substantially lower OHI scores, suggesting that ocean sustainability may be overstated and that policy should focus more on improving the weakest-performing dimensions.
An Experimental Test of Dual Discounting for Consumption and the Environment
(with M. A. Drupp and B. Groom)
Abstract:
To account for lower growth of non-market ecosystem services vis-à-vis market consumption goods, governments increasingly consider differentiated discount rates for public project appraisal. In lack of empirical evidence, they so far rely on ad-hoc assumptions for calibration. To fill this gap, we conduct a laboratory choice experiment to provide a first full specification of the canonical dual discounting model for consumption and the environment. We find that intertemporal inequality aversion is above unity for consumption, and below unity for ecosystem services. Importantly, we elicit cross-elasticities of marginal utility between the two goods for the first time, finding small positive values that imply a weak substitutability between market consumption and non-market ecosystem services. For recent growth projections, our estimates indicate that the social discount rate for the environment is around 1.5 percentage points lower than for consumption. While the latter is well approximated by the conventional simple Ramsey rule, substantial errors in the valuation of environmental costs and benefits will arise from guidelines that do not feature differentiated discount rates or adequate relative price adjustments.
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