UC Davis

I explore the effect of two distinct types of marijuana legislation, medical or recreational legalization, on alcohol and over-the-counter drug purchases. Using the Nielsen Scanner Data and a differences-in-differences approach, I find significant differences in the way marijuana interacts with other markets depending on the type of legislation. Alcohol purchases decreased by an estimated 11.8\% with medical marijuana legalization and increased by 38.9\% with recreational legalization.

For the remainder, I focus on the largest clean transportation program in California, the Clean Vehicle Rebate Project. The issue of equity in clean energy incentive programs led to the implementation of means testing the this program in 2016. Analysis highlights the importance of modeling choices and concludes that means testing led to increased electric vehicle adoption by low income households, estimating demand elasticity of -6.8 and identifying important interactions between equity and environmental impacts.

Finally, using linear probability and Probit models, I find that those purchasing more expensive vehicles and buyers living in areas with a higher proportion of low income households were less likely to apply for the California Clean Vehicle Rebate Project. Buyers living in the same zip code as the dealer where they purchased the vehicle all applied for a rebate. Purchasing an electric vehicle from a dealer that is larger or further away from the buyers registration location both were correlated with higher likelihood of applying for the California Clean Vehicle Rebate Project. These results are then put into the context of policy implications.