Evidence suggests that people's attitudes evolve and become more accepting after experiencing congestion pricing

After reading Resources for the Future's piece on congestion pricing, I feel the need to voice my frustration about the situation in New York. It is a common experience for academics to see their well-researched and published work on the current discourse, like congestion pricing, overlooked. This is why I am compelled to share my research on this matter.

There is no need to think of hypotheticals; my co-authors and I published research investigating three research questions for why public acceptability prevails as a significant barrier:

1. Does congestion pricing work?
2. Does experience and the resulting removal of the policy's uncertainties from a policy trial influence acceptability?
3. Do individual attributes impact the acceptability of tolls, and does this acceptability evolve when an individual becomes accustomed to the problem and policy?

Our research, conducted through laboratory experiments, provides practical insights. Participants were incentivized based on their performance in a congestion pricing game. They had opportunities to vote in favor of congestion pricing in a future stage before experiencing the congestion game, after experiencing the game, and after a trial period of congestion pricing. The congestion price in our game improves overall outcomes, but depending on how much of the congestion price revenue is redistributed, either all participants gain or there are winners and losers.

What we found were:

1. Our game's toll (i.e., congestion pricing) mitigates congestion and improves group outcomes.
2. Experience and accustomation to the congestion problem with and without congestion pricing and a trial's removal of uncertainty about the policy's effects influence attitudes; monetary self-interest appears to be a significant determinant of the opinion of the toll for both those made better off by the toll and those made worse by it.
3. Worldviews can shape individual support for congestion pricing when people have little experience with the consequences of congestion and earnings (e.g., voting before experiencing a congestion pricing trial). However, with experience (e.g., voting after experiencing a congestion price trial), support is driven by the impact of congestion pricing on earnings.

Without going into the details of the current situation with New York's (indefinitely) suspended congestion pricing program, our research demonstrated that:

• Experiencing congestion pricing can effectively change people's attitudes toward the policy.
• People rely on their worldviews as a heuristic when uncertain about the effects of such market-based environmental policies.
• There are winners and losers to congestion pricing that can generate overall net benefits.

The "unaffordable" $15 charge is a crucial point the governor used to justify her 11th-hour change of heart about congestion pricing. However, creating an effective price ceiling of $0 is not a solution. Whether $15 is too high or too low for New York's congestion charge, it is unambiguous that a congestion charge is not zero!!!

Please access our paper here:??https://t.co/cGwTnJAgeB