Quantitative Economics
Journal Of The Econometric Society
Edited by: Stéphane Bonhomme • Print ISSN: 1759-7323 • Online ISSN: 1759-7331
Edited by: Stéphane Bonhomme • Print ISSN: 1759-7323 • Online ISSN: 1759-7331
Quantitative Economics: Jul, 2019, Volume 10, Issue 3
Ujjayant Chakravorty, Marie‐Hélène Hubert, Beyza Ural Marchand
More than of US grain is used for energy due to the Renewable Fuel Mandate (RFS). There are no studies of the global distributional consequences of this purely domestic policy. Using micro‐level survey data, we trace the effect of the RFS on world food prices and their impact on household level consumption and wage incomes in India. We first develop a partial equilibrium model to estimate the effect of the RFS on the price of selected food commodities—rice, wheat, corn, sugar, and meat and dairy, which together provide almost of Indian food calories. Our model predicts that world prices for these commodities rise by 8– due to the RFS. We estimate the price pass‐through to domestic Indian prices and the effect of the price shock on household welfare through consumption and wage incomes. Poor rural households suffer significant welfare losses due to higher prices of consumption goods, which are regressive. However, they benefit from a rise in wage incomes, mainly because most of them are employed in agriculture. Urban households also bear the higher cost of food, but do not see a concomitant rise in wages because only a small fraction of them work in food‐related industries. Welfare losses are greater among urban households. However, more poor people in India live in villages, so rural poverty impacts are larger in magnitude. We estimate that the mandate leads to about 25 million new poor: 21 million in rural and 4 million in the urban population.
Biofuels distributional effects household welfare renewable fuel standard poverty D31 O12 Q24 Q42
March 5, 2024
The terms of the Editors of the Econometric Society's three journals end June 30, 2025. We are pleased to announce the incoming Editors and to thank the outgoing Editors for their excellent and continuing service.
Econometrica: Since 2019, Guido Imbens has served as the 14th Editor of Econometrica. On July 1, 2025, Marina Halac will become the Editor.
Quantitative Economics: Stéphane Bonhomme has been the Editor of Quantitative Economics since 2021. His successor will be Bernard Salanié.
Theoretical Economics: The Editor of Theoretical Economics since 2021 has been Simon Board. Taking over for him in July 2025 will be Federico Echenique.
Guido, Stéphane, and Simon have been outstanding Editors. We are grateful to them for the work they have done and will continue to do, and we look forward to further congratulating them next year. We believe Marina, Bernard, and Federico will be outstanding successors and we thank them in advance for their service.
Finally, we are grateful to Larry Samuelson for chairing all three search committees, and we thank the search committee members for their hard and fruitful work:
Econometrica: Christian Dustmann, Lars Hansen, Alessandro Lizzeri, George Mailath, Ariel Pakes, Helene Rey, and Elie Tamer.
QE: Kate Ho, Michael Keane, Felix Kubler, Whitney Newey, and Frank Schorfheide.
TE: Jeff Ely, Johannes Horner, Gilat Levy, Meg Meyer, and Ran Spiegler.