The WTA-WTP ratio with regard to environmental goods in the Netherlands
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2022-07-14
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en
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This thesis presents the results of a study that investigates the WTA-WTP ratio with regard to
environmental goods in the Netherlands. By conducting an online survey, in which 74 respondents
participated, data has been retrieved to derive the size of the WTA-WTP ratio with regard to
environmental goods and the influence on this ratio of several characteristics often mentioned in
relevant literature. These include the influence of gender, income, attitude towards the environment
and the degree of loss aversion. By making use of an OLS regression the following results were
retrieved. The WTA was found to be significantly higher than the WTP on average. Especially
with regard to environmental degradation the ratio was relatively high, it was found that the WTA
was three times as high as the WTP for this type of environmental good. The only characteristic
that was found to have an influence on the size of the ratio was gender. From these results several
potential policy measures can be derived to improve the environmental performance of the
Netherlands. Firstly, people could be incentivized to switch to environmental friendly sources of
energy and products by a temporary discount. Once people have switched to the sustainable option
they are not likely to switch back to the non-sustainable alternative, or they would require a much
higher compensation. Secondly, the government should look into allocating public environmental
space to its residents. Once people partially own for example nature reserves or a forest they would
require relatively high amounts of compensation for environmental degradation.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen