2008-11-11 papers

on Resource Economics

Issue of 2008‒11‒11
two papers chosen by

Determinants of Pollution Abatement and Control Expenditure: Evidence from Romania By Sova, Ana Maria; Sova, Robert; Rault, Christophe; Caporale, Guglielmo Maria
Does Wage Bargaining Justify Environmental Policy Coordination? By Aronsson, Thomas; Persson, Lars; Sjögren, Tomas

Determinants of Pollution Abatement and Control Expenditure: Evidence from Romania

By:	Sova, Ana Maria (CREST & Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne); Sova, Robert (CREST & Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne); Rault, Christophe (University of Orléans); Caporale, Guglielmo Maria (Brunel University)
Abstract:	The aim of the present study is to shed some light on the factors affecting Pollution Abatement and Control Expenditure (PACE) in the context of a transition economy such as Romania, in contrast to the existing literature which mostly focuses on developed economies. Specifically, we use survey data of the Romanian National Institute of Statistics and estimate Multilevel Regression Model (MRM) to investigate the determinants of environmental behaviour at plant level. Our results reveal some important differences vis-à-vis the developed countries, such as a less significant role for collective action and environmental taxes, which suggests some possible policy changes to achieve better environmental outcomes.
Keywords:	pollution abatement and control expenditure, transition economy, Multilevel Regression Model (MRM)
JEL:	Q52 C23
Date:	2008–10
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3787&r=res

Does Wage Bargaining Justify Environmental Policy Coordination?

By:	Aronsson, Thomas (Department of Economics, Umeå University); Persson, Lars (Department of Economics, Umeå University); Sjögren, Tomas (Department of Economics, Umeå University)
Abstract:	This paper analyzes the welfare consequences of coordinated tax reforms in an economy where a transboundary environmental externality and an international wage bargaining externality are operative at the same time. We assume that the wage in each country is decided upon in a bargain between trade-unions and firms, and the wage bargaining externality arises because the fall-back profit facing firms depends on the profit they can earn if moving production abroad. Using the noncooperative Nash equilibrium as a reference case, our results imply that the international wage bargaining externality may either reinforce or weaken the welfare gain of a coordinated increase in environmental taxation, depending on (among other things) how the reform affects the wage. For a special case, we also derive an exact condition under which a coordinated increase in the environmental tax leads to higher welfare.
Keywords:	Environmental taxes; externalities; policy coordination; trade-unions
JEL:	H23 J51
Date:	2008–11–03
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:umnees:0754&r=res

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