What do Environmental and Resource Economists Think? Results from a Survey of AERE Members

In this paper we present results from an opinion survey of Association of Environmental and Resource Economists members concerning issues ranging from basic market failure propositions to current policy questions to environmental behavior. The topical issues considered span the discipline including air and water pollution, sustainability, fishery, forestry and energy economics. We use entropy analysis to determine issues where there is consensus and multivariate analysis of the determinants of opinions. We find that AERE members reach consensus on a number of items of opinion and there are a number of items for which consensus is more difficult to reach. We find that agreement with items of opinion is influenced by noneconomic factors: concern about the environment and natural resources, political ideology, gender, the number of children in the household and United States residence. Key Words: