Carl Johan von Seth: Climate policy often has a kind of reverse Robin Hood-tendency

environmental Taxes are often regressive. In plain English: If the tax is increased on the fuel it will gobble up a larger part of the barnfamiljens household budget than the director's. Climate policy has often, therefore, a kind of reverse Robin Hood-tendency. Is it fair?

the Problem is known since a long time, but turned out to be truly antändligt when the yellow vests in France protested against president Macrons new diesel tax. In Sweden, the dilemma also acquired a new urgency with the government's 73-point programme. Where there is talk of a ”powerful green taxation” which is soon to become a reality.

On Thursday, wrote the left party Jonas Sjöstedt and his nordic partiledarkolleger on DN Debate on a new model for flygskatten. Their goal is precisely that transition will hurt more for the director than for families.

distribution concerns are solutions.

It is necessary actually not much creativity to design a plain green tax shift so a typical low-income households are compensated. If the government, for example, raises the drivmedelsskatten and using the proceeds to lower the matmomsen the average garantipensionären probably the winner, according to a calculation from Gothenburg school of Economics.

another, hajpad variant of the green tax shift is the idea that is called fee and dividend. The idea is simple: to Rake in money by a klimatskatt and distribute the proceeds in equal parts to everyone in the population.

In Sweden, the model is likely to have a strong progressive effect. The director would get out as much as garantipensionären – with the current Swedish carbon tax there will be approximately 2.300 sek per person per year – even if the ceo thus consumes much more fossil fuel.

to go even further. Jonas Sjöstedt and his colleagues did not mention in his op-ed how they plan to realise the idea of an aviation tax rises the more you fly. But a variant would be to introduce a private counterpart to the trade in emissions industry covered by the EU-level.

it gets more complicated. All people would then get a limited number of free allowances each year, which must be exchanged when, for example, the thoughts of the car or buying a plane ticket. The climate-saving allowances that can be sold at a utsläppstorg, where the flying over their quota must enter a bidding process and buy the right to consume more.

Private emissions trading could, in theory, be able to achieve the vänsterledarna talking about. The director, who according to the article goes to New York every other month, may pay money to the families as it is only a few times vacationing in Spain.

more and more often spoken about is that in different ways regulate or prohibit the discharges. The method is fairer than the use of economic instruments?

it All depends on how it is done. But there is really nothing that says that regelpolitik vanish fördelningsdilemmat. When it ozonskadande the substance CFC-12 was banned in car air conditioning systems in the 1990s paid by the consumer, of course, a higher price on the car. The cost was hidden, and relatively small. But it did not more fair. The same thing applies koldioxidregleringar.

the economic burden on the poor and the rich thus, if the parties want, to deal with fiscal policy the usual utensils. But there is another equity concern that none of the models solves easily. It is the gap between city and country.

the people of Stockholm has the subway, commuter trains and bus routes with frequent departures. Rural areas and most smaller cities and towns lack all of it.

In a depression which was made in the government's långtidsutredning 2003 counted on the regional impact of the green tax shift. The results, admittedly based on old figures, is dismaying.

In a hypothetical reform in which the switching height of the carbon dioxide tax for reduced general vat served the people of stockholm sek 260. Households in the Northern sparsely populated areas lost 80 dollars. And on the scale of winners and losers were Gothenburg and Malmö is actually closer to Abuse than the capital.

sometimes even företagsskatterna distributed unevenly over the country. In the government's vårbudget was raised, for example, gruvindustrins diesel tax. It threatens not so many jobs in Stockholm.

at the same time, we have agriculture, national institute of economic Research recently pointed out as particularly vulnerable in climate policy. The difference is large compared to the rest of the service industries.

The gap is difficult to access. The economic policy has fewer and weaker tools for managing regional inequalities. Those who talk about a just transition must consider just that.