David Rapson is a Chancellor’s Leadership Professor in the UC Davis Economics Department and Policy Advisor & Senior Research Economist at the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank.  The central objective of Professor Rapson’s work is to understand and demonstrate how consumers and firms respond to incentives, and what this implies for effective energy, environmental and economic policy.   His work examines a central tension of the energy transition.  On one hand, government intervention can improve outcomes when markets fail and when government policies set correct incentives; on the other hand, poorly conceived government interventions may create incentives that undermine goals that they are trying to achieve.  Professor Rapson’s research seeks to understand the difference to discern which policies will be effective.
 
At the moment, Professor Rapson’s research primarily focuses on the transportation sector, where decarbonization is challenging due to the centrality of fossil fuels as the main energy input.  He is an expert on electric vehicles, energy markets, climate policy and regulation.  His research appears in the American Economic Review, Science, Nature, and other academic journals.  Dr. Rapson has held various posts in service to the profession and the community.  He is currently Treasurer of the US Association of Energy Economists and is on the Editorial Council of the Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economics.  From 2015-2019 he was Associate Editor of the Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization.  He earned degrees from Dartmouth College (AB), Queen’s University (MA) and Boston University (PhD).