Professor Jane Hall's Studies in Air Pollution Prove Economic Benefit to Government Regulations
Professor Jane Hall is a leader in the multi-faceted field of environmental economics, which relies on basic economic concepts and applies them to environmental questions. Hall's work has been critical to understanding the impacts of air pollution on our health and economy, and for advancing air pollution control programs in Southern California.
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Anyone who drives a freeway can testify to Southern California’s metastasizing growth: a population increase of 40 percent between 1980 and 2000, an economic output increase of 80 percent. Yet during the same period, the region’s air quality improved significantly. Ozone levels, one major smog contributor, dropped by 50 percent. That’s because state and federal regulations require cleaner vehicles and less harmful factory emissions.
“Imagine what air quality would be, absent those regulations,” says Jane V. Hall, who has taught economics at Fullerton since 1981 and is a nationally recognized expert on environmental economics.
When clean-air regulations were first debated, some opponents argued they would cause the state’s economy to plummet. But Hall has conducted a series of studies documenting they not only improve the environment but provide economic benefits.
In one study, building on research showing that school absences due to respiratory illness increased on high ozone-level days, Hall and her department colleague Victor Brajer measured the dollar value of improved health.
They took into account factors such as the cost of medical care and wages lost by parents taking sick children to physicians. Their conclusion: In the South Coast Air Basin during the 1990s, the decrease in absences represented a likely economic benefit of about $245 million a year, or $75 for each school-age child in the region.
They chose school absences as a marker in part because a wealth of detailed data allowed comprehensive quantitative analysis. Also, Hall points out, “From a social point of view, school absences are significant. Not only do they impose time and treatment costs on families, they also take children out of an important learning environment.”
The multi-faceted field of environmental economics relies on basic economic concepts and applies them to environmental questions. Hall’s Ph.D. dissertation, on the benefits of reducing atmospheric sulfur, required an analysis combining issues of public health, engineering and economics. She chose that topic because she had been working on the California air quality standards for sulfur and for lead, representing what was then the
Environmental Defense Fund. Her early work has been credited with pushing California to control lead before
the nation did.
Air pollution experts are enthusiastic about her research. Robert Sawyer of the California Air Resources Board calls it “pioneering“ and says “Her studies have guided us in selecting cost-effective approaches to emissions reduction.”
“Jane Hall’s work is critical to understanding the devastating impacts of air pollution on our health and our economy. Her work in Los Angeles was important for advancing air pollution control programs in the South Coast Air Basin,” said Jim Lents, the Air Quality Board‘s former executive director.
“We have helped reframe the debate,” Hall says of her work. “No one credibly argues anymore that smog is not a health risk, and almost no one argues that there are not sizeable benefits in cleaning up. The debate has largely turned to who should be responsible and what to clean up.”
Her work has been criticized, too, by opponents of government regulation. How does she respond?
“Our response is to do the best work we can, to be clear about what is uncertain, and to publish in good peer review journals, such as Science, which we have. Of course we have been criticized. If that were not the case we
would hardly be discovering anything very interesting.
“And the conversation has changed over time. It is hard now, for example, to find a credible scientist who argues that fine particles are not a significant risk to health and life, yet in 1989 this was challenged. So, some of the issues have diminished with the significant advances in the health literature over the past two decades. Also, those who oppose regulation are now more inclined to argue that, sure, smog is a public health concern, but is that the best place to spend dollars?”
The studies do not include the costs of imposing the clean air standards. If they were included, would they affect the outcomes?
“We would still conclude that there are large benefits to cleaning up the air,” she says. “In the national studies now being done, which use the same basic research approach that we use, the findings consistently show that the benefits far outweigh the costs.
“It is also important to think not just about the total costs compared to benefits, but who pays with their health if the air is not cleaner? In all of the regions where this has been investigated, including our work in Southern California, the poor, children and minorities experience dirtier air more often, with the attendant consequences.”
Her next project will compare the three regions of Los Angeles, Houston, and the San Joaquin Valley to assess why Los Angeles has seen success in reducing air pollution while the problem persists in the other two regions. That study, involving collaboration with colleagues at UCLA and the University of Texas, will focus on atmospheric factors, economics, and politics.
“Having been at this for nearly 30 years, I seem destined to work on air pollution,” she says. “I have also done some work on the benefits of protecting the rocky intertidal zone (tide pools to most of us). My colleague in biology, Steve Murray, talked me into this one, and I find it fascinating.”
Hall is not only a force in environmental economics but a strong presence on campus. Last year she received
the Faculty Leadership in Collegial Governance Award, reflecting in part her accomplishments as Academic Senate chair.
She was named the university’s Outstanding Professor for 2000-01 and won the California State University Wang Family Excellence Award that year for outstanding faculty achievement.
By the way, in view of her air pollution studies, what kind of car does she drive?
“On average we drive two compact sedans. And we use ‘optimal dispatch.’ That is, if only one of us needs a car, the one with better fuel economy is driven and the other vehicle takes the day off.” 
