Does Commuting Change the Ranking of Environmental Instruments?

Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Working Paper No. 2007-01

26 Pages Posted: 1 Apr 2008

See all articles by Bert Saveyn

Bert Saveyn

Catholic University of Leuven (KUL)

Date Written: February 2006

Abstract

This paper studies the income effects of environmental policy in jurisdictions with a common labor market and a heterogeneous population (workers and polluters). A jurisdiction unilaterally improves its local environmental quality, using a subsidy, an environmental tax or command-and-control. In a closed economy, workers and polluters have some kind of a "natural ranking" of instruments for a given environmental objective. We find that commuting across jurisdictions may upset this "natural ranking" of environmental instruments. Further, we see that this inter-jurisdictional commuting exports pollution and the costs of environmental policy, possibly causing strategic behavior.

Keywords: environmental instrument choice, commuting, interest groups

JEL Classification: Q52, R23

Suggested Citation

Saveyn, Bert, Does Commuting Change the Ranking of Environmental Instruments? (February 2006). Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Working Paper No. 2007-01, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1113997 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1113997

Bert Saveyn (Contact Author)

Catholic University of Leuven (KUL) ( email )

Oude Markt 13
Leuven, Vlaams-Brabant
Belgium

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