Title: Equilibrium Particulate Exposure
Speaker: Matthew Turner, Brown University
Time: December 15th, 2020 9:00 – 10:30 AM (Beijing Time)
Zoom ID: 931 678 9264
Password: 790971
About the speaker:
Matthew Turner is a Professor of Economics at Brown University. He regularly teaches courses in urban and environmental economics, and occasionally, microeconomic theory. He is broadly interested in environmental and urban policy and his recent research focuses on the economics of land use and transportation. Current projects investigate the effects of the interstate highway system on US economic development, the relationship between subways and urban air pollution and the determinants of global particulate exposure. Professor Turner holds a Ph.D. in economics from Brown University. He is Vice President of the Urban Economics Association and a past Co-Editor of the Journal of Urban Economics. His research appears in the American Economic Review, the Journal of Political Economy, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Review of Economic Studies and Econometrica, and is regularly featured in the popular press.
Abstract:
We assemble global spatially disaggregated panel data describing ambient particulate levels and transport, population, and economic and polluting activities. These data indicate the importance of country level determinants of pollution, of the equilibrium process that separates or brings together people and particulates, of urbanization, and of the composition of economic activity and energy production. We then develop an Integrated Assessment Model describing particulate emissions, economic activity and particulate dispersion. We quantify the model for 31 countries representing more than 60% of world population. Model results indicate the importance of general equilibrium adjustments to particulates policy. For example, restrictions on agricultural burning increase equilibrium pollution exposure in the majority of countries by shifting labor to more polluting industries and locations. The model also indicates important cross-country heterogeneity in the effects of particulates policies.
