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Estimating the effect of a gasoline tax on carbon emissions

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  • Lucas W. Davis
  • Lutz Kilian

Abstract

Several policy makers and economists have proposed the adoption of a carbon tax in the United States. It is widely recognized that such a tax in practice must take the form of a tax on the consumption of energy products such as gasoline. Although a large existing literature examines the sensitivity of gasoline consumption to changes in price, these estimates may not be appropriate for evaluating the effectiveness of such a tax. First, most of these studies fail to address the endogeneity of gasoline prices. Second, the responsiveness of gasoline consumption to a change in tax may differ from the responsiveness of consumption to an average change in price. We address these challenges using a variety of methods including traditional single-equation regression models, estimated by least squares or instrumental variables methods, and structural vector autoregressions. We compare the results from these approaches, highlighting the advantages and disadvantages of each. Our preferred approach exploits the historical variation in U.S. federal and state gasoline taxes. Our most credible estimates imply that a 10 cent per gallon increase in the gasoline tax would reduce carbon emissions from vehicles in the United States by about 1.5%.

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Bibliographic Info

Article provided by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. in its journal Journal of Applied Econometrics.

Volume (Year): 26 (2011)
Issue (Month): 7 (November)
Pages: 1187-1214

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Handle: RePEc:wly:japmet:v:26:y:2011:i:7:p:1187-1214

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References

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  1. Lutz Kilian, 2008. "The Economic Effects of Energy Price Shocks," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 46(4), pages 871-909, December.
  2. Dahl, Carol & Sterner, Thomas, 1991. "Analysing gasoline demand elasticities: a survey," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 203-210, July.
  3. Kilian, Lutz & Gonçalves, Sílvia, 2002. "Bootstrapping Autoregressions with Conditional Heteroskedasticity of Unknown Form," Discussion Paper Series 1: Economic Studies 2002,26, Deutsche Bundesbank, Research Centre.
  4. James Alm & Edward Sennoga & Mark Skidmore, 2009. "Perfect Competition, Urbanization, And Tax Incidence In The Retail Gasoline Market," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 47(1), pages 118-134, 01.
  5. Don Fullerton & Sarah West, 1999. "Can Taxes on Cars and on Gasoline Mimic an Unavailable Tax on Emissions?," NBER Working Papers 7059, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  6. Chouinard, Hayley & Perloff, Jeffrey M., 2003. "Incidence of Federal and State Gasoline Taxes," Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UC Berkeley, Working Paper Series qt5q74052d, Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UC Berkeley.
  7. Jonathan E. Hughes & Christopher R. Knittel & Daniel Sperling, 2008. "Evidence of a Shift in the Short-Run Price Elasticity of Gasoline Demand," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 29(1), pages 113-134.
  8. Stock, James H & Wright, Jonathan H & Yogo, Motohiro, 2002. "A Survey of Weak Instruments and Weak Identification in Generalized Method of Moments," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 20(4), pages 518-29, October.
  9. Matthew D. Shapiro & Mark W. Watson, 1988. "Sources of Business Cycle Fluctuations," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 870, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
  10. Lutz Kilian, 2008. "Exogenous Oil Supply Shocks: How Big Are They and How Much Do They Matter for the U.S. Economy?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(2), pages 216-240, May.
  11. Kilian, Lutz & Vega, Clara, 2008. "Do Energy Prices Respond to U.S. Macroeconomic News? A Test of the Hypothesis of Predetermined Energy Prices," CEPR Discussion Papers 7015, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  12. Ventzislav Ivanov & Lutz Kilian, 2005. "A Practitioner's Guide to Lag Order Selection For VAR Impulse Response Analysis," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 9(1), pages 2.
  13. Julio J. Rotemberg & Michael Woodford, 1996. "Imperfect Competition and the Effects of Energy Price Increases on Economic Activity," NBER Working Papers 5634, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  14. Dahl, Carol A, 1979. "Consumer Adjustment to a Gasoline Tax," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 61(3), pages 427-32, August.
  15. Lutz Kilian, 2010. "Explaining Fluctuations in Gasoline Prices: A Joint Model of the Global Crude Oil Market and the U.S. Retail Gasoline Market," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 2), pages 87-112.
  16. Doyle Jr., Joseph J. & Samphantharak, Krislert, 2008. "$2.00 Gas! Studying the effects of a gas tax moratorium," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(3-4), pages 869-884, April.
  17. Cooley, Thomas F. & Leroy, Stephen F., 1985. "Atheoretical macroeconometrics: A critique," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 283-308, November.
  18. Ramsey, J B & Rasche, R & Allen, Bruce T, 1975. "An Analysis of the Private and Commercial Demand for Gasoline," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 57(4), pages 502-07, November.
  19. Peter C. Reiss & Matthew W. White, 2008. "What changes energy consumption? Prices and public pressures," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 39(3), pages 636-663.
  20. Marcelo J. Moreira, 2003. "A Conditional Likelihood Ratio Test for Structural Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(4), pages 1027-1048, 07.
  21. Richard Schmalensee & Thomas M. Stoker, 1999. "Household Gasoline Demand in the United States," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 67(3), pages 645-662, May.
  22. Katharine G. Abraham & John C. Haltiwanger, 1995. "Real Wages and the Business Cycle," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 33(3), pages 1215-1264, September.
  23. Edelstein, Paul & Kilian, Lutz, 2007. "Retail Energy Prices and Consumer Expenditures," CEPR Discussion Papers 6255, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
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Citations

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Cited by:
  1. Anderson, Soren T., 2012. "The demand for ethanol as a gasoline substitute," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 151-168.
  2. Ralf Martin & Ulrich J. Wagner & Laure B. de Preux, 2009. "The Impacts of the Climate Change Levy on business: Evidence from Microdata," CEP Discussion Papers dp0917, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
  3. repec:zwi:wpaper:2 is not listed on IDEAS
  4. Ralf Martin & Laure B. de Preux & Ulrich J. Wagner, 2011. "The Impacts of the Climate Change Levy on Manufacturing: Evidence from Microdata," NBER Working Papers 17446, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  5. Kilian, Lutz & Vigfusson, Robert J., 2012. "Do Oil Prices Help Forecast U.S. Real GDP? The Role of Nonlinearities and Asymmetries," CEPR Discussion Papers 8980, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  6. Li, Shanjun & Linn, Joshua & Muehlegger, Erich, 2012. "Gasoline Taxes and Consumer Behavior," Working Paper Series rwp12-006, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
  7. Nicholas Rivers & Brandon Schaufele, 2012. "Carbon Tax Salience and Gasoline Demand," Working Papers 1211E, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.
  8. Paul J. Burke & Shuhei Nishitateno, 2011. "Gasoline prices, gasoline consumption, and new-vehicle fuel economy: Evidence for a large sample of countries," Departmental Working Papers 2011-15, The Australian National University, Arndt-Corden Department of Economics.
  9. Hunt Allcott & Jean-Nathan Wozny, 2010. "Gasoline Prices, Fuel Economy, and the Energy Paradox," Working Papers 1003, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research.
  10. Lutz Kilian & Daniel P. Murphy, 2012. "Why Agnostic Sign Restrictions Are Not Enough: Understanding The Dynamics Of Oil Market Var Models," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 10(5), pages 1166-1188, October.
  11. Kilian, Lutz, 2011. "Structural Vector Autoregressions," CEPR Discussion Papers 8515, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.

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