Download or read book Essays in Public Finance and Environmental Economics written by Radhika Goyal and published by . This book was released on 2023 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dissertation focuses on topics concerning public finance, state capacity, and the environment. In the first chapter, we study the role of proximity to administrative power in explaining spatial inequality in access to public goods. Using a natural experiment in India that quadrupled the number of sub-districts (the lowest level of administrative jurisdiction), we explore the impact of redistribution of political power on spatial inequality of public good investment. By analyzing digitized high-resolution data encompassing approximately 10,000 villages spanning over 55 years, we demonstrate that reducing the distance to local government headquarters helps in bridging the gap in the provision of essential public amenities for remote villages, and furthermore, yields evidence of long-term improvements in state capacity. In the second chapter, we focus on turning points in tax collection. Our method detects both sustained accelerations and decelerations of tax collection (relative to GDP) in a global and historical sample of 150 countries since 1965. Turning points are prevalent (238 events in total), persistent for at least 15 years in many cases, and occur more frequently at lower levels of the country's development. We show that changes in the political environment are strong statistical predictors of accelerations, tax reforms, and economic changes less so. Decelerations appear more unpredictable than accelerations. In the third chapter, we study the ecological gains of place-based environmental measures to ramp up conservation efforts. By combining geo-referenced Indian village maps overlaid with digitized protected area maps and a fuzzy regression discontinuity design, we find that protected areas help improve forest cover. Villages located within protected areas also experienced improved economic activity, attributed in part to the growth of the tourism sector, particularly in wildlife sanctuaries. Moreover, our findings suggest that states which allocate a higher share of expenditure to the forestry sector exhibit stronger forest conservation outcomes.

Download or read book Three Essays in Public Finance and Environmental Economics written by Sanghyun Hwang and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first essay studies the Marginal Cost of Funds in the existence of tax evasion. We develop a general equilibrium model of tax evasion, including the expected utility of taxpayers and three different revenue-raising government policies. In this rich model environment, we analytically derive the marginal cost of funds (MCF) for the alternative policy instruments. We consider two main fiscal reforms: the revision in the nonlinear tax scheme and the changes in enforcement mechanism (the audit and penalty rates). First, we derive the MCF for the tax reform and find its key determinants. The derived MCF is greater than the previous ones since it includes a "risk-bearing cost" as well as tax distortion. The reform in enforcement mechanism generates MCFs in different forms. Two more MCFs with respect to audit and penalty rates are presented. Finally, we compare these three different MCFs in numerical example and provide some policy implications. The second essay explores optimal tax structure in the presence of status effect. When the consumption of certain goods affects one's social status, this externality creates two opposite effects in a society. Seeking higher status through "positional goods" gives individuals much incentive to supply labor but still allocates income for less "nonpositional goods" as well. In this case, differential taxes on positional goods work as corrective instruments to internalize the social cost stemming from status seeking. Furthermore, the differential taxes generate revenue that can be used to alleviate preexisting income tax distortion. Thus, the differential taxes on positional goods could give so called "double dividend." I develop a game-theoretic model in which each individual with a different labor productivity unknown to the others engages in a status-seeking game, and the government has a revenue requirement. Then I show that, under a condition in which utility is separable between positional goods and leisure, a revenue-neutral shift in the tax mix away from nonlinear income taxes towards positional-good taxes enhances welfare. Hence, the differential taxes on positional goods are necessary together with the nonlinear income taxes for an optimal tax structure. The third essay explores the impact of increasing capital mobility on regional growth and environment. I develop an endogenous growth model in which each local government competes against the others, to induce imperfectly mobile stock of capital into its region. Then I show that an increase in capital mobility generates "tax importing" due to which each locality experiences a higher growth rate and more degraded environment. That is, the increasing mobility dampens the capital tax and transfers the burden of pollution abatement to the locality. This finding supports the hypothesis of "race to the bottom" in environmental standards. Identifying a reduction in overall welfare of residents, I consider two alternative federal interventions in the model: uniform environmental standard and requirement of lump sum transfer or tax. Both of these federal instruments enhance the residents' welfare.

Download or read book Environmental and Public Economics written by Wallace E. Oates and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 1999 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this collection of essays honoring the work of Wallace E. Oates, contributors apply his ideas and insights to a range of problems. Chapters on environmental economics assess environmental policy in today's conservative era and analyze environmental taxes, environmental federalism, and policy instruments. Chapters on public economics investigate vouchers for private schools, capitalization, and urban growth controls. Other subjects examined include intergovernmental grants in South Africa, and public pensions in the EU. The editors are affiliated with the University of Maryland-College Park, and Resources for the Future in Washington, DC. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Download or read book Three Essays at the Intersection of Public Finance and Environmental Economics written by Antung Anthony Liu and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 95 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dissertation is comprised of three essays which explore environmental economics topics using public finance tools. The first and third essays are applied theory papers examining two overlooked factors -- tax evasion and the shadow economy -- which sharply alter the calculus of carbon tax reform. The basic finding is that carbon taxes are much less costly than has previously been found, particularly in developing countries. The second essay is an empirical paper studying how China's tax system has impacted its rollout of sewage treatment plants.

Download or read book Environmental Policy and Fiscal Federalism written by Wallace E. Oates and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2004 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wally Oates is one of the most important scholars in both environmental economics and public finance and this new volume of his essays collects together his best recent research in both these areas, covering theory, research and policy. The first half of the book includes papers on the political economy of environmental policy, the analysis of environmental regulation and environmental federalism. The second half deals with fiscal and regulatory competition, state and local government finance and fiscal federalism. This new collection will be essential reading for scholars and students in both environmental economics and public finance.

Download or read book Economic Theory for the Environment written by Karl-Göran Mäler and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2002 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text investigates many of the contemporary advances in economics, in terms of the management of natural resources and environments. The authors also concentrate on other important issues such as control theory for non-convex economic problems, duopoly theory, game theory, local public finance, patent races and population control. In addition, they investigate the difficulties involved in constructing environmental agreements, and detail the potential benefits of marrying together the disciplines of ecology and economics. As a whole, the book illustrates both the power and limitations of economics to shed light on many of today's pressing environmental issues.

Download or read book Essays on Public Finance and Environmental Economics in Namibia written by Michael N. Humavindu and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 70 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Public Economics and the Environment in an Imperfect World written by Lans Bovenberg and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Growing populations and economies have increased the public's awareness that the world's environmental resources are finite. The issues of global warming and the depletion of the ozone layer have given universal significance to what were once local and regional pollution problems. What is evident from Public Economics and the Environment in an Imperfect World is that Coasian negotiations fail to internalize the costs of environmental degradation, often calling for public intervention through the market mechanism. In its consideration of such issues the book includes contributions on assessment problems, institutional aspects, the need for coordination and efficiency, and distribution issues.

Download or read book Essays in Public Finance and Environmental Policy written by Patrick Andre Schwarz and published by . This book was released on 2022 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This thesis consists of three chapters in environmental economics and public finance. The first chapter tests for adverse selection on private information in the market for flood insurance. Using detailed flood insurance policy microdata and newly available estimates of flood risk, I develop a measure of excess flood risk not used by the insurer to price insurance policies. I then use this measure as the basis for an unused observables test described in Finkelstein and Poterba (2014) and find that the market in certain areas that FEMA categorizes as low-risk, which together make up 40% of all flood insurance policies, is adversely selected. My results hold even after conditioning on a rich set of demographic and housing characteristics and measures of flood risk information and salience, suggesting that at least part of the selection is directly risk-based. The second chapter studies the distributional properties of federal disaster aid and how barriers to take-up vary across the income distribution. Using applicant-level microdata from FEMA's primary emergency relief program from 2002-2019, I find that lower-income households receive more aid in expectation, both conditional on applying and conditional on receiving aid. This is consistent with the idea that lower-income households experience relatively greater uninsured necessary expenses following disasters. Despite this, I also find suggestive evidence that the non-monetary costs of applying for aid are highest among lower-income households, and estimate that program take-up sharply declines among the poorest households. Access to disaster recovery field offices, which provide assistance with filing disaster aid applications, significantly increases take-up among lower-income households but not higher-income households, implying that they increase the targeting efficiency of aid along the income distribution. The third chapter, written with Faraz Hayat, investigates whether firms' input decisions are sensitive to the value-added tax (VAT) they pay on purchases. The study uses rich VAT return data from Pakistan combined with variation in VAT rates on electricity from a quasi-experiment. In contrast to the standard theory that intermediate VATs have no impact on production decisions, we find that electricity demand is responsive to VAT rates. Our results are not driven by changes in tax evasion in response to changing VAT rates. Rather, we provide evidence that frictions in the VAT refund system explain our results, as many of the firms we study collect no VAT on their output and therefore rely on the government to reimburse their VAT credits.

Download or read book Essays in Public and Environmental Economics written by Nicolas Chanut and published by . This book was released on 2022 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Essays in Environmental Finance written by Mihir Tirodkar and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This thesis comprises of three empirical studies that examine separate interactions between environmental variables and financial markets. Set within a U.S. backdrop, the studies integrate and analyse relationships between asset pricing, corporate finance, behavioural finance, and environmental economics. The first chapter examines whether low frequency temperature risk, a component of climate risk, is a priced risk factor in equity markets. Rising temperatures are associated with states of poor consumption and potential disasters; consumption-based asset pricing theories suggest investors prefer investments which pay off in these poor states. I estimate low frequency temperature shocks and employ them in asset pricing tests. Results provide no evidence of a low frequency temperature risk premium in U.S. equity markets. I discuss possible reasons as to why results may diverge from the asset pricing theory. The second chapter tests whether institutional investors are reluctant to own polluter ‘sin’ stocks. I hypothesise that sensitivity to social norms restricts institutional ownership of polluters. Using toxic emissions data from the Toxic Release Inventory, I find results that are consistent with the hypothesis. Furthermore, I find that institutions with long-term investment horizons and exposure to public scrutiny display a stronger reluctance to own polluters. I find no evidence of positive abnormal performance of polluter stocks, as hypothesised by the ‘shunned-stock’ theory. The final chapter examines security analyst earnings forecasts for polluter firms. Polluters are negatively exposed to increased regulations and consumer backlash; however, security analysts may misestimate associated costs. Tests show that analysts generate systematically pessimistic forecasts for polluter firm earnings on average; behavioural theories suggest that this pessimism is due to cognitive constraints. I also find evidence of persistent analyst bias for polluters, consistent with the conservatism bias theory. Results provide no evidence of polluter abnormal returns resulting from positive earnings surprises around earnings announcements.

Download or read book Macroeconomics and the Environment written by Salah El Serafy and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2013-01-01 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'This is an important book. It not only serves as a valuable contribution to green accounting, it is a testament to Salah El Serafy's tireless efforts to reform the national income accounts in ways that would better reveal the sustainable product of nations and the value of development policies. No matter what differences the reader may have with some of the points made, there is no denying that the world would be a much improved place if the reforms suggested by El Serafy were implemented.' – Philip Lawn, Flinders University, Australia 'This book is a fabulous summary of Salah El Serafy's seminal contributions to "greening" national income accounts. If only we had employed the famous "El Serafy method" of investing depletion of non-renewable resources into renewable alternatives, the world would be in a much stronger and more sustainable place today. Hopefully it is not too late to take up this and El Serafy's many other recommendations for improving national income accounting.' – Robert Costanza, Portland State University, US Though scientists and environmentalists have long expressed concern over the rapid deterioration of the global environment, economists have largely failed to recognize the issue's relevance to their field. Salah El Serafy argues for an increased focus on the economic aspects of environmental degradation, calling for a fundamental shift in how economists measure and discuss national income. Through a combination of new material reflecting recent developments in the field and previously published essays that provide a history of green accounting, the author emphasizes the importance of considering natural resources as part of a nation's economic capital. Setting forth what has become known as the 'El Serafy Method', this fascinating and complex volume presents both the justification and the methodology for giving the environment a place in the global economic conversation. Students, professors, researchers and policymakers in the field of environmental and ecological economics will no doubt find much to appreciate in this thoughtful and comprehensive analysis of the intersection between economics and the environment.

Download or read book Environment and Development written by K. R. Shanmugam and published by SAGE Publications Pvt. Limited. This book was released on 2016-02-15 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Grounded in current issues and constraints, this book focuses on valuing environmental degradation, green economic growth, trade–environment linkage, climate change, health outcome efficiency and public works programmes. Can the ‘impressive’ growth rates registered by the Indian economy last in the long run? If so, are they inclusive of the key dimensions of well-being? Can the balance between India’s demand for and supply of natural capital make the country an ecological debtor? This volume, in honour of Professor U. Sankar, addresses such significant debates and provides policy initiatives to tackle these issues. This book argues that sustainable development as a long-term objective demands a paradigm shift in the approach to viewing ecology and that sustainability has to be assessed in terms of economic, social and environmental outcomes.

Download or read book Essays on Public and Environmental Economics written by Chrystie T. Burr and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the last 10 years, the solar photovoltaic (PV) market has experienced tremendous growth due in part to government incentive programs. However the effect and welfare analysis of these policy instruments remain ambiguous. In the first chapter of my dissertation, we estimate a dynamic model of households investment decisions on rooftop PV systems to understand the impact of these programs on residential solar installations and evaluate the outcome of alternative incentive policies. The model separately evaluates the effect of system prices, up-front subsidies, tax credits and production revenues using a 5-year data set collected by the California Solar Initiative program, which subsidized solar installations in California. The results indicate that capacity-based subsidies are equally effective as production-based subsidies, but that the latter are more efficient. With a

Download or read book Three Essays in Environmental Economics written by Koji Kotani and published by . This book was released on 2005 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Public Finance and Stabilization Policy written by Richard Abel Musgrave and published by . This book was released on 1974 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Economics of Sustainable Food written by Nicoletta Batini and published by Island Press. This book was released on 2021-06-08 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Economics of Sustainable Food details the true cost of food for people and the planet. It illustrates how to transform our broken system, alleviating its severe financial and human burden. The key is smart macroeconomic policy that moves us toward methods that protect the environment like regenerative land and sea farming, low-impact urban farming, and alternative protein farming, and toward healthy diets. The book's multidisciplinary team of authors lay out detailed fiscal and trade policies, as well as structural reforms, to achieve those goals. Chapters discuss strategies to make food production sustainable, nutritious, and fair, ranging from taxes and spending to education, labor market, health care, and pension reforms, alongside regulation in cases where market incentives are unlikely to work or to work fast enough. The authors carefully consider the different needs of more and less advanced economies, balancing economic development and sustainability goals. Case studies showcase successful strategies from around the world, such as taxing foods with a high carbon footprint, financing ecosystems mapping and conservation to meet scientific targets for healthy biomes permanency, subsidizing sustainable land and sea farming, reforming health systems to move away from sick care to preventive, nutrition-based care, and providing schools with matching funds to purchase local organic produce.--Amazon.