Pennsylvania Residents' Perceptions and Support for Climate Change Policies
Open Access
Author:
Axtman, Alison
Area of Honors:
Global and International Studies
Degree:
Bachelor of Arts
Document Type:
Thesis
Thesis Supervisors:
Janet Kay Swim, Thesis Supervisor Krista Brune, Thesis Honors Advisor
Keywords:
climate change policies environmental social individual economic and business economic impacts
Abstract:
The research aims to examine the extent to which residents of Pennsylvania support three climate change policies being considered by the state. A web-based survey assessed agreement with a range of possible anticipated positive and negative environmental, social, individual economic, and business economic impacts. The findings show that the Carbon Tax is significantly preferred over the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), and likewise, the Renewable Portfolio Standards policy is significantly more favored than RGGI. The remaining policies are equally supported. Differences in political party and policy type create unique patterns, with Republican respondents being significantly more inclined to support the Carbon Tax cut policy. It is noteworthy that Republican respondents have similar preferences to Independents and Democrats for the Carbon Tax cut policy, but significantly less preference for the remaining policies. Participants anticipate that the policies will have a more significant environmental impact than individual economic impact. Our hypothesis that perceiving favorable environmental, social, individual economic, and business economic impacts is positively associated with policy support is supported by the analyzed data.
