Food Labeling Policies: Aggregate Impacts and Heterogeneity Across Categories

Nano Barahona, Cristóbal Otero (), Sebastián Otero and Joshua J. Kim

No 35737, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We study the aggregate and heterogeneous effects of a front-of-package labeling policy implemented in Chile. We find that consumers reduced their sugar and caloric intake by 9% and 6%, respectively. On the demand side, labels prompt consumers to substitute within categories rather than switching between categories. Within-category responses are more pronounced when labels provide new information. On the supply side, we observe bunching at regulatory thresholds, with substantial heterogeneity across categories, consistent with differing costs of product reformulation. We conclude that considering policy-response heterogeneity is key for effective policy design.

JEL-codes: D12 D22 I12 I18 L11 L81 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-09
Note: EH IO PE
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w35737.pdf (application/pdf)
Access to the full text is generally limited to series subscribers, however if the top level domain of the client browser is in a developing country or transition economy free access is provided. More information about subscriptions and free access is available at http://www.nber.org/wwphelp.html. Free access is also available to older working papers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35737

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w35737
The price is Paper copy available by mail.

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().