This paper analyzes the joint responses of commodity futures prices and traders' futures positions to changes in the VIX before and after the recent financial crisis. We find that while financial traders accommodate the needs of commercial hedgers in normal times, in times of distress, financial...

The large inflow of investment capital to commodity futures markets in the last decade has generated a heated debate about whether financialization distorts commodity prices. Rather than focusing on the opposing views concerning whether investment flows either did or did not cause a price...

This paper first considers the impact on world food prices of the changes in restrictions on trade in staple foods during the 2008 world food price crisis. Those changes--reductions in import protection or increases in export restraints--were meant to partially insulate domestic markets from the...

The share of U.S. corn production used to produce ethanol increased from 12.4% in the 2004/05 crop year to over 38.5% in the 2010/11 crop year, and remained at that high level in 2011/12. Even after accounting for return of by-products to the feed market, this is a large and persistent new...

Construction codes that regulate the energy efficiency of new buildings have been a centerpiece of US environmental policy for 40 years. California enacted the nation’s first energy building codes in 1978, and they were projected to reduce residential energy use—and associated pollution—by...

Natural gas has emerged as an increasingly attractive source of energy since it is highly efficient, abundant, and cleaner than any other fossil fuel. In this paper, we examine the impact of widespread adoption of natural gas as a source of fuel on infant mortality in Turkey, using variation...

Improving end-use energy efficiency—that is, the energy-efficiency of individuals, households, and firms as they consume energy—is often cited as an important element in efforts to reduce greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions. Arguments for improving energy efficiency usually rely on the idea that...

Energy-efficient technologies offer considerable promise for reducing the financial costs and environmental damages associated with energy use, but these technologies appear not to be adopted by consumers and businesses to the degree that would apparently be justified, even on a purely financial...

Information provision is a key element of government energy-efficiency policy, but the information that is provided is often too coarse to allow consumers to make efficient decisions. An important example is the ubiquitous yellow “EnergyGuide” label, which is required by law to be displayed...

We analyze optimal policy when consumers of energy-using durables undervalue energy costs relative to their private optima. First, there is an Internality Dividend from Externality Taxes: aside from reducing externalities, they also offset distortions from underinvestment in energy efficiency....