Synthesis of evidence yields high social cost of carbon due to structural model variation and uncertainties.

Estimating the cost to society from a ton of CO-termed the social cost of carbon (SCC)-requires connecting a model of the climate system with a representation of the economic and social effects of changes in climate, and the aggregation of diverse, uncertain impacts across both time and space. A growing literature has examined the effect of fundamental structural elements of the models supporting SCC calculations. This work has accumulated in a piecemeal fashion, leaving their relative importance unclear.

The European Union Emissions Trading System might yield large co-benefits from pollution reduction.

Mitigating greenhouse gas emissions and reducing air pollution represent two pressing and interwoven environmental challenges. While international carbon markets, such as the European Union emissions trading system (EU ETS), have demonstrated their effectiveness in curbing carbon emissions (CO[Formula: see text]), their indirect impact on hazardous co-pollutants remains understudied. This study investigates how key toxic air pollutants-sulfur dioxide (SO[Formula: see text]), fine particulate matter (PM[Formula: see text]), and nitrogen oxides (NO[Formula: see text])-evolved after the introduction of the EU ETS with a comparative analysis of regulated and unregulated sectors.

Accounting for the increasing benefits from scarce ecosystems.

As people get richer, and ecosystem services scarcer, policy-relevant estimates of ecosystem value must rise.

Moral dilemmas and trust in leaders during a global health crisis.

Trust in leaders is central to citizen compliance with public policies. One potential determinant of trust is how leaders resolve conflicts between utilitarian and non-utilitarian ethical principles in moral dilemmas. Past research suggests that utilitarian responses to dilemmas can both erode and enhance trust in leaders: sacrificing some people to save many others ('instrumental harm') reduces trust, while maximizing the welfare of everyone equally ('impartial beneficence') may increase trust.

The social cost of contacts: Theory and evidence for the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany.

Building on the epidemiological SIR model, we present an economic model with heterogeneous individuals deriving utility from social contacts creating infection risks. Focusing on social distancing of individuals susceptible to an infection we theoretically characterize the gap between private and social cost of contacts. Our main contribution is to quantify this gap by calibrating the model with unique survey data from Germany on social distancing and impure altruism from the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Moral Suasion and the Private Provision of Public Goods: Evidence from the COVID-19 Pandemic.

We study how moral suasion that appeals to two major ethical theories, Consequentialism and Deontology, affects individual intentions to contribute to a public good. We use the COVID-19 pandemic as an exemplary case where there is a large gap between private and social costs and where moral suasion has been widely used as a policy instrument. Based on a survey experiment with a representative sample of around 3500 Germans at the beginning of the pandemic, we study how moral appeals affect contributions with low and high opportunity costs, hand washing and social distancing, to reduce the infection externality as well as the support for governmental regulation.

Low-dose, non-supervised, health insurance initiated exercise for the treatment and prevention of chronic low back pain in employees. Results from a randomized controlled trial.

Objective: Back pain is a major problem requiring pragmatic interventions, low in costs for health care providers and feasible for individuals to perform. Our objective was to test the effectiveness of a low-dose 5-month exercise intervention with small personnel investment on low back strength and self-perceived pain.

Methods: Two hundred twenty-six employees (age: 42.