Behavioral Policy Speaker Series: Hunt Allcott—Regressive Sin Taxes: What Is the Optimal Soda Tax?

Date & Time Apr 19 2018 4:30 PM - 6:00 PM
Speaker(s)
Hunt Allcott, Associate Professor of Economics, New York University
Audience Open to the Public

Hunt Allcott, Associate Professor of Economics at New York University, will deliver the next talk in the Behavioral Policy Speaker Series, Thursday, April 19, 4:30-6:00 p.m. in 399 Julis Romo Rabinowitz Building.

Allcott, who research focuses on consumer behavior, business strategy,  and regulatory policy, will speak on “sin taxes”—corrective taxes on goods like cigarettes, alcohol, and sugary drinks, which are believed to be over-consumed.  A common objection to these taxes is that they fall disproportionately on low-income consumers. Alcott will present results from a study that looks at the interaction between corrective and redistributive motives in a general optimal taxation framework in the spirit of Atkinson and Stiglitz (1976).  The study calibrates the model using the Nielsen Homescan dataset of household grocery purchases combined with a specially designed survey measuring temptation and health knowledge.