Responsibility-Sensitive Fairness and Carbon Tax Rebates

Last registered on August 24, 2026
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Responsibility-Sensitive Fairness and Carbon Tax Rebates
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0019316
Initial registration date
August 18, 2026

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
August 24, 2026, 9:09 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

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Primary Investigator

Name
Anton Knoche
Affiliation
PIK
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Franziska Funke
PI Affiliation
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK)
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PI Name
Michael Pahle
PI Affiliation
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK)
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Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2026-08-20
End date
2026-12-31
Keywords
Behavior, Environment & Energy
Additional Keywords
climate policy; fairness preferences; redistribution
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
Do people hold responsibility-sensitive fairness preferences regarding others' greenhouse gas emissions? We study this question in the context of the German heating transition through an incentivized survey experiment fielded in the German Heating and Housing Panel. In a randomized factorial design, participants allocate carbon pricing rebates between households that differ in responsibility-relevant conditions at the time of their heating technology choice. Exogenous variation in policy environments—information about future CO₂ costs and access to subsidies for climate-friendly alternatives—identifies how information and economic capacity shape judgments of responsibility and deservingness. This allows us to isolate responsibility-sensitive fairness preferences and compare them to income-based redistributive motives, providing causal evidence on how citizens incorporate responsibility into climate compensation judgments.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Funke, Franziska, Anton Knoche and Michael Pahle. 2026. "Responsibility-Sensitive Fairness and Carbon Tax Rebates." AEA RCT Registry. August 24. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.19316-1.0
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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We embed an incentivized survey experiment in Wave 6 of the German Heating and Housing Panel. Respondents complete three incentivized spectator-style allocation tasks in which they divide a carbon pricing rebate of 300 Euro between two households whose characteristics are varied experimentally. Respondents are randomly assigned to one of two information treatments or a control condition. The treatments provide short informational texts about the German policy environment surrounding residential heating technology choices.
Intervention Start Date
2026-08-20
Intervention End Date
2026-09-13

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
1) Rebate allocation: the amount (0-300 Euro) that a spectator allocates in each task to household A against the fixed reference household B.

2) Perceived responsibility: four post-task perception items (responsible, informed, able, free), dichotomized.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
The rebate allocation is elicited on a seven-point response scale in 50-Euro increments (300/0, 250/50, 200/100, 150/150, 100/200, 50/250, 0/300) and converted to Euro amounts; "don't know / no answer" responses are coded as missing.

The four perceived-responsibility items are elicited after each of the two fossil-fossil allocation tasks on five-point Likert scales: household A (1) bears overall responsibility for its current CO2-levy burden (responsible); (2) had sufficient information at the time of installation to assess future CO2 costs and make an informed decision (informed); (3) had an economic option to choose a more climate-friendly alternative (able); (4) could take the replacement decision freely, uninfluenced by unfortunate external circumstances (free). Each item is dichotomized: the binary outcome equals 1 if the response is strictly above the scale midpoint (4 or 5) and 0 otherwise.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
1) Allocative uncertainty: respondents' stated degree of certainty about the fairness of their allocation.

2) Understanding of the policy environment: are people aware of the information conveyed by T1 and T2.

3) General fairness preferences: how much do people care of responsibility when deciding if climate policy is fair.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
The experiment is embedded in Wave 6 of the German Heating and Housing Panel, an annual online household panel survey. Respondents are randomly assigned to one of two information treatments or a control group and subsequently complete three incentivized spectator-style allocation tasks in which they divide a fixed carbon pricing rebate of 300 Euro between two households whose characteristics are varied experimentally (factorial vignette design). Allocation decisions are incentivized: one randomly drawn decision is implemented, with rebate amounts paid out to randomly selected panel households that display the corresponding characteristics.
Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
Randomization is conducted automatically by the survey software (computer-based randomization) and is not visible to respondents.
Randomization Unit
Treatment assignment (T1 / T2 / control) is randomized at the individual (respondent) level. Vignette attributes of household A are additionally randomized at the task level within respondent.
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
Treatment is not clustered
Sample size: planned number of observations
Expected final sample of at least 10,000 respondents. Each respondent completes three allocation tasks, yielding up to 20,000 fossil-fossil allocation decisions (Tasks 1 and 2, pooled) and 10,000 heat-pump allocation decisions (Task 3).
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Approximately 3,333 respondents in Treatment T1 (information requirement), 3,333 respondents in Treatment T2 (subsidy availability), and 3,333 respondents in the control group.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
German Association for Experimental Economic Research e.V.
IRB Approval Date
2026-08-18
IRB Approval Number
GRpSYtyi
Analysis Plan