Location Choice and Food Trade-Offs: Does Local Matter?

Abstract

We use housing transactions to estimate consumer preferences for living near direct-marketed locally produced food, which has implications for both consumer- and producer-centric land use policies. We estimate a pure characteristics sorting model to recover preferences and conduct counterfactual simulations accounting for price feedback effects following resorting after changes to the local food environment. We find that consumers significantly value healthy food access, including different direct sources of locally produced foods. However, the welfare gains and associated price changes arising from policies to increase local food access depend on the targeting method, a key concern for policy makers worried about affordability.