Exploring community public budget preferences for transport electrification: Evidence from a contingent budget allocation study in New South Wales, Australia

ABSTRACT The allocation of funds across government functions often reflects political priorities that do not align with public expectations. This paper employs a contingent allocation method in which respondents are required to distribute a fixed budget across 12 different potential project types. The main goal of this research is to elicit community priorities for public spending with a specific focus on transport electrification. Based on a sample of 727 residents from the state of New South Wales (NSW), Australia, our findings indicate that transport electrification is not regarded as a majority priority relative to initiatives aimed at improving healthcare, utilities, roads and education. Further, we find that the prioritisation of decarbonising transport services is heavily influenced by households' financial circumstances: individuals experiencing financial distress are less inclined to allocate substantial public resources to curbing transport-related emissions. These results suggest that policy actions should be designed to ensure that climate transition measures do not disproportionately burden financially vulnerable communities.