Lee S. Friedman

Professor of Public Policy

 

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Contact Information

Email:  lfried@berkeley.edu
Phone:   (510) 642-7513,   Fax:  (510) 643-9657

Snail mail:        

Goldman School of Public Policy
University of California at Berkeley
2607 Hearst Avenue
Berkeley, CA 94720-7320

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Biography

Lee Friedman is an economist at the Richard & Rhoda Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He is a graduate of Dartmouth College and received his Ph.D. from Yale University. After two years of analytic experience working for the Vera Institute of Justice in New York City, he joined the Berkeley faculty in 1974 to help fashion the economics curriculum of the public policy program.  He became Professor of the Graduate School and Professor Emeritus of Public Policy in 2016. His research is on a wide variety of issues, among them climate change policies, utility regulation, educational finance, criminal justice policies, agricultural subsidies, and consumer decision-making. His work strives to improve the effectiveness of microeconomic policy analysis on actual public policies and practices. He is a recipient of the David N. Kershaw Award for distinguished public policy research, and of the University of California's Distinguished Teaching Award. He is former Editor of the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, and has served as President of the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.

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Publications

Book

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The Microeconomics of Public Policy Analysis (Princeton University Press, 2002); further information including the table of contents and a sample chapter is available. >> more information

For users interested in the errata, please click MPPA Errata. The Solutions Manual (available from Princeton for adopting instructors) has some errata as well; please click Solutions Manual Errata.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some Other Publications and Papers (by area)

Environmental policy research 

  • “Consumers' Willingness to Pay for Renewable and Nuclear Energy: A Comparative Analysis between the
    US and Japan”     (with Kayo Murakami, Takanori Ida, and M akoto Tanaka), Energy Economics, 50, July 2015, pp. 178-189. We investigate through a survey-based choice experiment US and Japanese consumer preferences for two alternative fuels, nuclear and renewable sources, as energy sources that have potential to reduce GHG emissions. The results for the US are similar across the four states sampled concerning consumers’ WTP for the reduction of air emissions: people are willing to pay approximately $0.30 per month for a 1% decrease in GHG emissions. Second, the average consumer expresses a negative preference for increases in nuclear power in the fuel mix in both countries. Japanese consumers have a stronger aversion to nuclear energy than US consumers. Third, US and Japanese consumers will pay more for emissions reduction with the use of renewable sources. Finally, we have shown that results like those found in this study can be useful in helping to set parameters for renewable energy policies like FIT rates and RPS stringency.
  • "Consumers' Willingness to Pay for Alternative Fuel Vehicles: A Comparative Discrete Choice Analysis between the U.S. and Japan," (with Makoto Tanaka, Takanori Ida, and Kayo Murakami), Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 70, December 2014, pp. 194-209. This paper is based upon a stated preference survey to conduct comparative analysis of Japan with four U.S. states concerning consumer preferences for alternative fuel vehicles. It also illustrates the use of such surveys for forward-looking policy analysis, finding that increased price subsidies for alternative fuel vehicles could have a significant effect on their market share.
  • "Electricity Pricing and Electrification for Efficient Greenhouse Gas Reductions,"a report published by Next 10 and the California Council on Science and Technology, July 2013. To reach its 2050 greenhouse gas reduction goal, California electricity must become cleaner and some activities that are now fossil-fueled must run partially or fully on the cleaner electricity—a process termed electrification. This paper recommends pricing policy reforms that will help to make decarbonization and electrification decisions effectively and efficiently.
  • "The Importance of Marginal Cost Electricity Pricing to the Success of Greenhouse Gas Reduction Programs" Energy Policy, 39, No. 11,  November 2011, pp. 7347-7360. This paper documents a previously unnoticed problem for the efficient reduction of GHG emissions, namely the substantial mispricing of off-peak electricity, and concludes that to fix it requires faster deployment of smart meters, mandatory time-of-use electricity rates, and marginal-cost based rate designs that are sensitive to important distributional concerns. An earlier version was presented at the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management, Washington, DC, November 2009.
  • "Should the Regulator or the Market Decide When to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions?," (with Jeff Deason), The Economists' Voice, 6, No. 13, December 2009, Article 1.
  • "Intertemporal Regulatory Tasks and Responsibilities for Greenhouse Gas Reductions," (with Jeff Deason), revised March 2010. This is a preprint of a paper that has now been published in The Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 29, No. 4, Fall 2010, pp. 821-853. An earlier version was presented at the international Conference on Environmental Policy, Seoul, Korea, June 11-13, 2009. 

    Accepting the importance of achieving GHG reduction goals, this paper explains that existing and proposed GHG cap-and-trade programs have costly intertemporal inefficiencies and how much of this inefficiency can be avoided. You may be able to access the published version online (if you are an APPAM member or if your organization has an agreement with the publisher) by going to Wiley Interscience.
  • "Should California Include Motor Vehicle Fuel Emissions in a Greenhouse Gas Cap-and-Trade Program?" This is a preprint of the article whose final and definitive form is in The Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis, 12, No. 3, June 2010, pp. 215-248 (copyright Taylor and Francis).

  • A book review of  Markets for Clean Air, by A. Denny Ellerman, Paul L. Joskow, Richard Schmalensee, Juan-Pablo Montero, and Elizabeth M. Bailey, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press; and Waste Trading among Rich Nations, by Kate O'Neill, Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2000; Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 21, No. 4, Fall 2002, pp. 717-721.

    You may be able to access this online (if you are an APPAM member or if your organization has an agreement with the publisher) by going to Wiley Interscience. This is the book review section; please go to pp. 717-721.

 

Behavioral Economics 

Policy Analysis and Political Economy

  • "Presidential Address: Peanuts Envy?" Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 18, No. 2, Spring 1999, pp. 211-225.

    You may be able to access this online (if you are an APPAM member or if your organization has an agreement with the publisher) by going to Wiley Interscience.

 

Public Economics 

  • "Public Sector Pricing: An Institutional Approach," (with Christopher Weare). In F. Thompson and M. Green, eds., Handbook of Public Finance, Marcel Dekker (New York, NY: 1998), pp. 597-658.

 

Econometric Methodology 

 

Utility Regulation and Restructuring 

  • "Consumer-Friendly and Environmentally-Sound Electricity Rates for the Twenty-First Century." This paper considers whether there are feasible, efficient and equitable time-varying electricity rate structures that will be attractive to large numbers of residential customers. It introduces Household On and Off peak (HOOP) plans that utilize marginal-cost time-based rates except for fixed infrastructure charges that are assigned to customers categorized into groups by historic annual consumption levels, with the assigned group fee varying in accordance with equity principles across the groups. The HOOP designs are tested on a sample of residences representative of California as a whole, and found to be able to replicate reasonably closely the actual bill distribution. An earlier version was presented at the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management, Washington, DC, November 2011.
  • "The History of Electricity Restructuring in California," (with C. J. Blumstein and R. J. Green), Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, 2, No. 1/2, 2002, pp. 9-38.

    You may be able to access this at Springer Online. If not, a prepublication version is available at the UC Energy Institute.

  • "The California Electricity Crisis: The Long and the Short of It," International Journal of Public Policy, 4, No. 1/2, 2009, pp. 4-31.

    The theme of this work is on market power issues that may arise when policy makers create new market opportunities. It explains transitional market power in new markets and ongoing stochastically arising market power, and policies to avoid or mitigate both kinds. It emphasizes the role of long-run contracting in restructured electricity markets, and why the ban on it for California utilities was one of the causes of the California electricity crisis.

 

 

course syllabi

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Misc. Opinions

 

 

favorite Berkeley restaurant for a light, relaxing late-night meal:

  • Fonda's (1501A Solano Avenue)
     

All-time favorite Berkeley restaurant:

  • Chez Panisse (1517 Shattuck Ave., Cafe;: 548-5049; Restaurant: 548-5525).

 

Favorite London restaurant:

  • I thought this was going to be the empty set, but kudos to Tendido Cero for its Spanish tapas (174 Old Brompton Road, SW5, Ph:020 7370 3685)

     

favorite Florence restaurants for casual dining: 

  • Olio & Convivium (via Santa Spirito 4)

  • Cantinetta Antinori (Piazza degli Antinori 3), and

  • Caffe del Cibreo (via dei Macchi 118r)

 

FAVORITE MAUI RESTAURANT:

 

  • Hali'imaile General Store (900 Hali'imaile Road, Makawao)

 

Favorite recent novels:

  • 2004: Matthew Pearl, The Dante Club

  • 2005: Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner

  • 2006: Yann Martel, Life of Pi
  • 2007: Susanne Alleyn, Game of Patience
  • 2008: Martin Clark, The Legal Limit
  • 2009: Steig Larsson, The Girl who Played with Fire
  • 2010: Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall: A Novel
  • 2011: Jo Nesbo, The Snowman
  • 2012: Chad Harbach, The Art of Fielding: A Novel
  • 2013: Bill Roorbach, Life Among Giants
  • 2014: Kevin Powers, The Yellow Birds: A Novel

 

Favorite BIRD PHOTOGRAPHS

To see some of my bird photography, leave this site and click on Bird Photographs and Observations by Lee Friedman (still under construction). I also file recent photographs on Lee S. Friedman at flickr.