Research

My CV (10/23)

Until recently, I was a Principal Economist at The Cadmus Group. Previously, I was an assistant professor of economics at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. I have a Ph.D. in economics from Northwestern University and B.A. in economics from the University of Pennsylvania.

Contact Information:

James I.  Stewart

tel. 503-799-4562

email: econjim@gmail.com

Energy Research

Shock Avoidance: Experimental Evidence on High Bill Alerts and Household Energy Consumption (with Grant Jacobsen, latest version)

Spurred by a variety of regulatory requirements, energy utilities implement many types of programs to help customers conserve energy and reduce their bills.  Most programs are designed without consideration of whether they help consumers avoid large unexpected bills, although such shocks may be particularly harmful to consumer welfare.  Using a field experiment, we evaluate a high bill alert program that alerts customers to unusually high usage patterns, with the goal of helping customers avoid large bill shocks.  We find that the alert program reduced mean consumption by about 0.5%.  Quantile regression estimates indicate that the effects were small and insignificant at the bottom of the usage distribution and larger and significant at the top of the usage distribution, showing the program was effective at allowing households to experience fewer large expenditure shocks.  This result holds both when we measure usage nominally or when we scale it to a relative measured based on each households pre-program usage levels.  The findings underscore the benefits of moving beyond analyses of average effects in program evaluation in the energy settings. More nuanced evaluations of the manner which energy savings are achieved is likely to become increasingly important as the energy system transitions toward a greater share of renewables and increased supply of electricity to electric vehicles.  

How Do Consumers Respond to Price Complexity? Experimental Evidence from the Power Sector (with Grant Jacobsen, Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, October 2022)  [Research Highlight ("Price of Complexity") in Nature Energy (October 2022).] 

Time-variant prices for electricity aim to influence the shape of residential demand. The most common time-variant prices are time-of-use (TOU) prices, which vary by hour of day, and event-based prices, which take effect during idiosyncratic “critical” events. We present evidence on the effects of TOU prices and event-based prices when implemented in isolation versus simultaneously. The key finding is that time-variant prices reduce demand during critical events by 19% when event-based pricing is implemented in isolation, but only 5% when TOU and event-based prices are implemented together. The results suggest that price complexity may dull consumer responsiveness to price signals.

Utility Customer Supply of Demand Response Capacity (The Energy Journal, October 2020)

This research investigates utility customer supply of demand response capacity to electric utilities. Using panel data on annual utility demand response capacity and capacity payments between 2010 and 2016, I estimate the long-run price elasticity of supply of demand response capacity from residential, commercial, and industrial customers. The supply of demand response capacity was price-inelastic, with elasticities of 0.5 for residential customers, 0.6 for commercial customers, and 0.4 for industrial customers. These estimates are long-run supply elasticities because utility customers could enter or exit demand response markets. Also, residential customer supply of demand response capacity was heterogeneous, affected by characteristics such as customer education, urban residency, and home space heating fuel. These findings will be of interest to regulators, utility resource planners, and program administrators who want to increase demand response capacity.

Economic History Research

The Economic History of the American Frontier. Nevin's Prize Finalist Dissertation Summary. (Journal of Economic History, June 2005)

Migration to the Agricultural Frontier and Wealth Accumulation, 1860-1870 Tables  (Explorations in Economic History, October 2006)

Abstract: I use a new data set of households linked between the 1860 and 1870 censuses to study frontier migration. Households that moved to the frontier to farm were more likely than non-migrants to have been poor, landless, and illiterate, and to have had young children. Also, after controlling for observable differences, migrants had below average abilities to accumulate wealth. These findings suggest fewer opportunities for migrants to accumulate wealth in non-frontier areas and a reason for their migration. Nonetheless, migrants fared well, accumulating wealth at high rates. The gains in wealth of migrants, especially those with long tenure on the frontier, suggest the extraordinary benefits of migration.  

Cooperation When N is Large: Evidence from the Mining Camps of the American West (Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, March 2009)

Abstract : The sources of cooperation in small groups are well documented. There is, however, less understanding about cooperation in large groups. I study the enforcement of property rights in the mining camps of the American West. Miners demanded secure property rights and protection from violence to exploit the region's mineral wealth and organized governments for this purpose. In the model, miners must divide their labor between mining and supporting property rights institutions. The main prediction of the model is that cooperation in property rights enforcement emerges only when social norms about cooperation are sufficiently widespread. The model also predicts that social norms are less effective in mining camps with large populations or high labor productivity. I test these predictions against detailed evidence from the letters, diaries, and reminiscences of miners in 25 camps in California, Colorado, and Montana, and find that the evidence supports the predictions. The results show that social norms can significantly lower the costs of collective action in large groups.

Economic Hardship or Opportunity? The Causes of Geographic Mobility on the Agricultural Frontier, 1860-1880 (Journal of Economic History, March 2009)

Abstract: Historians disagree about whether geographic mobility on the frontier reflected economic hardship or opportunity because of the inability to observe the outcomes of non-persisters. This paper uses a new sample of frontier families linked between the 1860, 1870, and 1880 U.S. censuses to study mobility and wealth accumulation. Using the incidence of Confederate guerrilla warfare in frontier counties to generate exogenous migration, I find the effect of geographic persistence on wealth accumulation is insignificant. Families observed in the same township or county in 1860 and 1870 accumulated wealth no faster than families observed in different frontier townships or counties.  Young, blue collar, and landless families—those with the highest net benefits of migration—were the most likely to move.  Also, in general, individual characteristics before migration to the frontier such as wealth, occupation, and place of origin did not affect persistence on the frontier after migration. These findings reflect widespread economic opportunity on the frontier.

Migration to U.S. Frontier Cities and Job Opportunity (Explorations in Economic History,  June 2012)

Abstract: I use a new sample of families linked between the 1860 and 1880 U.S. censuses to study the impact of migration to frontier cities on job holding. Using variation in transportation costs between different regions of the country to generate exogenous migration, I find frontier city migration had significant job-holding benefits. The impact of migration on job holding was 68 percent greater for immigrants than for the native born. Expectations about job holding were the most important factor in the decision to migrate to a frontier city. Clerical workers, unskilled blue-collar workers, immigrants, and the poor were also the most likely to migrate. These results show the benefits of geographic mobility and suggest the contribution of frontier cities to economic opportunity in America’s past.    

Homesteading, Wealth Accumulation, and Frontier Populism (2021, working paper)

Abstract: 

Abstract: This paper studies frontier farmers’ wealth accumulation and participation in the Populist movement of the late nineteenth century. Frontier farmers made very large gains in wealth, and these gains were primarily attributable to transfers of federal government land under the Homestead Act. Consistent with the prediction of a simple, stylized model that wealth accumulation increased risk-averse farmers’ demand for Populist policies, farmers who made the greatest gains in wealth were 50 percent more likely than others to belong to the Farmers’ Alliance, a large and influential Populist political organization. The findings highlight the role of federal land policy in wealth accumulation and the effect of wealth accumulation on incentives for political participation. The findings also complement existing research about the causes of Populism emphasizing the risks of frontier agriculture. At the highest level, this research illustrates how frontiers can influence a nation’s institutional development.