Areas of Expertise (3)
Energy and Environmental Economics
Labor Economics
Public Economics
About
Reed Walker is an Associate Professor of Business and Public Policy and Economics at UC Berkeley. His research explores the social costs of environmental externalities, such as air pollution and how regulations to limit these externalities contribute to gains and/or losses to the economy. He is the faculty co-director of the UC Berkeley Opportunity Lab's Climate and Environment Initiative. He is also a Research Associate at the Energy Institute at Berkeley, a faculty research fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and a research fellow at IZA. He received his PhD in economics from Columbia University.
Education (3)
Columbia University: PhD, Economics 2012
Columbia University: MA, Economics 2009
Colgate University: BA, Mathematical Economics 2004
Links (2)
Honors & Awards (2)
Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Sloan Research Fellowship
2017
IZA Young Labor Economist Award
2015
Positions Held (1)
At Haas since 2014
2016 – present, Co-Director, Climate and Environment Initiative, UC Berkeley Opportunity Lab 2016 – present, Research Associate, Energy Institute at Haas 2014 – present, Faculty Research Fellow, National Bureau of Economic Research 2014 – present, Assistant Professor, Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley 2014 – present, Faculty Research Fellow, National Bureau of Economic Research 2012 – 2014, Robert Wood Johnson Scholar in Health Policy, University of California, Berkeley
Media Appearances (8)
Carbon Tax Sidelined in Biden’s Push on Climate, Taxes
The Wall Street Journal online
2021-03-24
Progressive Democrats are moving away from carbon trading as a policy, saying it hurts minorities in locations where factories emit pollutants. But research has found the opposite. An older federal program that allows higher-polluting plants to buy offsets from less-polluting plants didn’t disproportionately move pollution to lower-income communities or communities of color, according to research by Assoc. Prof. Reed Walker, the Transamerica Chair in Business Strategy, co-authored with faculty affiliate Assoc. Prof. Joseph Shapiro of the the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.
Soot rule thrusts EPA into spotlight on race
E&E News online
2020-06-12
A new EPA proposal has made experts take a look at how air pollution is linked to systemic racism. According to research by Assoc. Prof. Reed Walker, the Transamerica Chair in Business Strategy, disparities between soot levels in predominantly minority and white areas fell by nearly two-thirds between 2000 and 2015. The drop is largely linked to the aggressive enforcement of the Clean Air Act's particulate matter standards, which were implemented in 2005.
Rich Californians Shell Out $30,000 to Avoid Blackout Pain
Bloomberg online
2019-11-26
As inequality in the state grows more extreme, backup power systems will be just one more issue that widens the gap, said Assoc. Prof. Reed Walker, the Transamerica Chair in Business Strategy. "The current state of adaptation, which is currently 'I hope you can afford a generator or Tesla Powerwall,' is misguided," Walker said.
Donald Trump's environmental policies will actually make us stupider
Mother Jones online
2018-08-28
A recent analysis by Assist. Prof. Reed Walker of the Business & Public Policy Group found strong regulations on air quality have been highly effective in the U.S., and air quality could have more impact on intellect than previously realized.
Air pollution from U.S. manufacturing lower; regulations among other factors credited
Air Quality Matters online
2018-08-18
The author discusses research by Asst. Prof. Reed Walker of the Haas Business & Public Policy Group that polluting emissions from U.S. manufacturing fell by 60 percent between 1990 and 2008—a period in which manufacturing output grew significantly—primarily because manufacturers adopted cleaner production methods in tandem with increasingly strict environmental regulation.
Environmental regulations drove steep declines in U.S. factory pollution
UC Berkeley News online
2018-08-09
Asst. Prof. Reed Walker's research finds that polluting emissions fell even when manufacturing output grew significantly, primarily because manufacturers adopted cleaner production methods in tandem with increasingly strict environmental regulation.
Do Regulations Really Kill Jobs?
The Atlantic online
2017-01-19
'For example, in a 2013 paper in the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Berkeley economist W. Reed Walker followed what happened to workers at firms impacted by the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments, which required polluting firms to obtain operating permits. He wanted to know whether workers who left newly-regulated companies were able to easily find other jobs (he did not know whether the workers were fired or quit, just that they left).'
Can We Help the Losers in Climate Change?
MIT Technology Review online
2016-08-08
'In economic theory, human mobility should benefit both the downtrodden areas people are leaving, by tightening the job market, and the more prosperous ones that need new workers. Subsidizing migration, though, has moral and political implications that many find unsettling. “There’s a psychic cost to relocating—if there weren’t, we’d see a lot more mobility in the U.S. than we do,” says Reed Walker, an assistant professor at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley.'
Selected Papers & Publications (11)
The Distribution of Environmental Damages
Review of Environmental Economics and Policy
Reed Walker, Solomon Hsiang, and Paulina Oliva
2018
Why is Pollution from U.S. Manufacturing Declining? The Roles of Environmental Regulation, Productivity, and Trade
American Economic Review
Reed Walker and Joseph Shapiro
2018
Regulating Mismeasured Pollution: Implications of Firm Heterogeneity for Environmental Policy
American Economic Review – Papers and Proceedings
Reed Walker, Eva Lyubich, and Joseph Shapiro
2018
The Relationship Between Season of Birth, Temperature Exposure, and Later Life Well-Being
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Reed Walker, Adam Isen, and Maya Rossin-Slater
2017
Every Breath You Take - Every Dollar You'll Make: The Long-Term Consequences of the Clean Air Act of 1970
Journal of Political Economy
Reed Walker, Adam Isen, and Maya Rossin-Slater
2017
Airports, Air Pollution, and Contemporaneous Health
Review of Economic Studies
Reed Walker and Wolfram Schlenker
2016
Environmental Health Risks and Housing Values: Evidence from 1600 Toxic Plant Openings and Closings
American Economic Review
Reed Walker, Janet Currie, Lucas Davis, and Michael Greenstone
2015
The Transitional Costs of Sectoral Reallocation: Evidence from the Clean Air Act and the Workforce
Quarterly Journal of Economics
Reed Walker
2013
Traffic Congestion and Infant Health: Evidence from E-ZPass
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
Reed Walker and Janet Currie
2011
Environmental Regulation and Labor Reallocation: Evidence from the Clean Air Act
American Economic Review: Papers and Proceedings
Reed Walker
2011
Explaining the Determinants of Operating Budgets at U.S. National Parks
Public Finance Review
Reed Walker and Robert Turner
2006
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