Mattioli, G orcid.org/0000-0003-1309-554X, Wadud, Z orcid.org/0000-0003-2692-8299 and Lucas, K orcid.org/0000-0002-4009-7017 (2018) Vulnerability to fuel price increases in the UK: A household level analysis. Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 113. pp. 227-242. ISSN 0965-8564
Abstract
In highly motorised countries, some sectors of the population own and use cars despite struggling to afford their running costs, and so may be particularly vulnerable to motor fuel prices increases, whether market-led or policy-driven. This paper proposes a novel, disaggregated approach to investigating vulnerability to such increases at the household level. We propose a set of indicators of ‘car-related economic stress’ (CRES), based on individual household level expenditure data for the UK, to identify which low-income households spend disproportionately on running motor vehicles, and to assess the depth of their economic stress. By subsequently linking the dataset to local fuel price data, we are able to model the disaggregated price elasticities of car fuel demand. This provides us with an indicator of each households’ adaptive capacity to fuel price increases. The findings show that ‘Low-Income, High Cost’ households (LIHC) account for 9% of UK households and have distinct socio-demographic characteristics. Interestingly, they are characterised by very low responses to fuel price increases, which may cause them to compromise on other important areas of their household expenditures. Simulations suggest that a 20% increase in fuel prices would substantially increase the depth, but not the incidence of CRES. Overall, the study sheds light on a sector of the population with high levels of vulnerability to fuel price increases, owing to high exposure, high sensitivity and low adaptive capacity. This raises challenges for social, environmental and resilience policy in the transport sector.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | (c) 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/BY/4.0/). |
Keywords: | Oil vulnerability; Price elasticities; Distributional impacts; Fuel demand; Transport affordability; Low-income households |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences (Leeds) > School of Chemical & Process Engineering (Leeds) The University of Leeds > Faculty of Environment (Leeds) > Institute for Transport Studies (Leeds) > ITS: Sustainable Transport Policy (Leeds) The University of Leeds > Faculty of Environment (Leeds) > School of Earth and Environment (Leeds) > Sustainability Research Institute (SRI) (Leeds) |
Funding Information: | Funder Grant number EPSRC EP/M008096/1 |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 24 Apr 2018 10:35 |
Last Modified: | 02 Aug 2019 15:21 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Elsevier |
Identification Number: | 10.1016/j.tra.2018.04.002 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:130011 |
Commentary/Response Threads
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Mattioli, G, Wadud, Z and Lucas, K
Vulnerability to fuel price increases in the UK: A household level analysis. (deposited 24 Apr 2018 10:35)
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- Mattioli, G, Wadud, Z and Lucas, K Corrigendum to “Vulnerability to fuel price increases in the UK: A household level analysis” [Transport. Res. Part A: Pol. Pract 113 (2018) 227–242]. (deposited 18 Jan 2019 13:29)