Environmental Taxation
A Guide for Policy Makers
This guide is based on the OECD‟s recently issued book Taxation, Innovation and the Environment.
Overview
Environmental challenges are increasing the pressure on governments to find ways to reduce environmental damage while minimising harm to economic growth. Governments have a range of tools at their disposal, including regulations, information programmes, innovation policies, environmental subsidies and environmental taxes. Taxes in particular are a key part of this toolkit.
Environmental taxes have many important advantages, such as environmental effectiveness, economic efficiency, the ability to raise public revenue, and transparency. Also, environmental taxes have been successfully used to address a wide range of issues including waste disposal, water pollution and air emissions. Regardless of the policy area, the design of environmental taxes and political economy considerations in their implementation are crucial determinants of their overall success.
This policy guide has a few key messages:
Why use environmental taxes?
Taxes can directly address the failure of markets to take environmental impacts into account by incorporating these impacts into prices.
Environmental pricing through taxation leaves consumers and businesses the flexibility to determine how best to reduce their environmental “footprint”.
This enables lowest-cost solutions, provides an incentive for innovation and minimises the need for government to attempt to “pick winners”.
How to design environmental taxes?
Environmental tax bases should be targeted to the pollutant or polluting behaviour, with few (if any) exceptions.
The scope of an environmental tax should ideally be as broad as the scope of the environmental damage.
The tax rate should be commensurate with the environmental damage.
The tax must be credible and its rate predictable in order to motivate environmental improvements.
Environmental tax revenues can assist fiscal consolidation or help to reduce other taxes.
Distributional impacts can, and generally should, be addressed through other policy instruments.
Competitiveness concerns need to be carefully assessed; coordination and transitional relief can be effective responses.
Clear communication is critical to public acceptance of environmental taxation.
Environmental taxes may need to be combined with other policy instruments to address certain issues.
The rest of this guide develops these points in greater detail.
Environmental TaxationA Guide for Policy MakersThis guide is based on the OECD‟s recently issued book Taxation, Innovation and the Environment.OverviewEnvironmental challenges are increasing the pressure on governments to find ways to reduce environmental damage while minimising harm to economic growth. Governments have a range of tools at their disposal, including regulations, information programmes, innovation policies, environmental subsidies and environmental taxes. Taxes in particular are a key part of this toolkit.Environmental taxes have many important advantages, such as environmental effectiveness, economic efficiency, the ability to raise public revenue, and transparency. Also, environmental taxes have been successfully used to address a wide range of issues including waste disposal, water pollution and air emissions. Regardless of the policy area, the design of environmental taxes and political economy considerations in their implementation are crucial determinants of their overall success.This policy guide has a few key messages:Why use environmental taxes? Taxes can directly address the failure of markets to take environmental impacts into account by incorporating these impacts into prices. Environmental pricing through taxation leaves consumers and businesses the flexibility to determine how best to reduce their environmental “footprint”. This enables lowest-cost solutions, provides an incentive for innovation and minimises the need for government to attempt to “pick winners”.
How to design environmental taxes?
Environmental tax bases should be targeted to the pollutant or polluting behaviour, with few (if any) exceptions.
The scope of an environmental tax should ideally be as broad as the scope of the environmental damage.
The tax rate should be commensurate with the environmental damage.
The tax must be credible and its rate predictable in order to motivate environmental improvements.
Environmental tax revenues can assist fiscal consolidation or help to reduce other taxes.
Distributional impacts can, and generally should, be addressed through other policy instruments.
Competitiveness concerns need to be carefully assessed; coordination and transitional relief can be effective responses.
Clear communication is critical to public acceptance of environmental taxation.
Environmental taxes may need to be combined with other policy instruments to address certain issues.
The rest of this guide develops these points in greater detail.
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