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Price Elasticity of Gas Demand on L1 and L2: Evidence from Ethereum and Arbitrum

Pranay Anchuri, Akaki Mamageishvili

arXiv 11 Jun 2026 · Econometrics

arXiv:2606.13555 · PDF · DOI · OpenAlex · Extracted main text

Abstract

We estimate the causal price elasticity of gas demand on Ethereum mainnet (L1) and Arbitrum One (L2), a quantity necessary for calibrating fee mechanism simulations, evaluating resource pricing reforms, and explaining observed usage patterns. A two-way fixed effects panel regression instrumented by each wallet's own lagged base fee removes the congestion-driven endogeneity that causes naive regressions to substantially underestimate demand sensitivity. On Ethereum mainnet (full year 2025), the pooled IV elasticity is -0.006***, near-inelastic: a 10% fee increase reduces total gas demand by approximately 0.06%. On Arbitrum One (October 2025--April 2026), the pooled IV elasticity is -0.036**. Both chains are inelastic in the aggregate, with L2 measurably more responsive than L1. A per-resource decomposition of L2 demand reveals elasticities ranging from modestly elastic computation (-0.027*) to -0.27*** for refunds, with storage growth (-0.15***) and calldata (-0.06*) in between. Behavioral clustering identifies always-on protocol wallets as near-inelastic and high-volume operators as substantially more responsive, with cluster-level elasticities up to roughly 6x the pooled estimate. These results establish an empirical foundation for downstream simulations and for evaluating fee mechanism designs.

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Most heavily cited references

The works this paper leans on most, across its whole bibliography — not restricted to papers in our corpus. Ranked by composite intensity, which combines how often a work is mentioned, how many sections mention it, and how much of that falls in the main text rather than the appendix.

ReferenceIntensityMentionsSectionsMain text
1Hao Chung and Elaine Shi (2023) Foundations of Transaction Fee Mechanism Design0.64422100%
2Stefanos Leonardos and Barnabé Monnot and Danijar Reijsbergen and Ef… (2021) Dynamical Analysis of the EIP-1559 Ethereum Fee Market0.64422100%
3Tim Roughgarden (2021) Transaction Fee Mechanism Design for the Ethereum Blockchain: An Economic Analysis of EIP-15590.64422100%
4Tim Roughgarden (2021) Transaction Fee Mechanism Design0.64422100%
5Guillermo Angeris and Theo Diamandis and Ciamac C. Moallemi (2025) Multidimensional Blockchain Fees Are (Essentially) Optimal0.40511100%
6Joshua D. Angrist and Jörn-Steffen Pischke (2009) Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist's Companion0.40511100%
7Joshua D. Angrist and Alan B. Krueger (1991) Does Compulsory School Attendance Affect Schooling and Earnings?0.40511100%
8Ferenc Béres and István András Seres and András A. Benczúr and Miker… (2021) Blockchain Is Watching You: Profiling and Deanonymizing Ethereum Users0.40511100%
9Wenhao Wang and Aditya Saraf and Lioba Heimbach and Kushal Babel and… (2026) Blockspace Under Pressure: An Analysis of Spam MEV on High-Throughput Blockchains0.40511100%
10Severin Borenstein (2005) The Long-Run Efficiency of Real-Time Electricity Pricing0.40511100%

Showing the top 10 of 34 scored citations.