La fiscalité carbone, facteur de compétitivité. Réduire les charges sociales et énergétiques

National audienceJeudi 22 août, le gouvernement s'est déclaré en faveur d'une " contribution climat-énergie", et déjà les attaques fusent : une nouvelle taxe affaiblirait les entreprises et les consommateurs, alors que les priorités sont la lutte contre le chômage et contre les déficits publics et sociaux, bien plus urgentes que l'évolution du climat. Or, une telle taxe peut précisément répondre à ces priorités. Pour s'en convaincre, il ne faut pas perdre de vue deux forces majeures qui contraignent - et contraindront longtemps - le développement de l'économie française

Carbon Tax and Equity : The Importance of Policy Design

This research aims at clearing up misunderstandings about the distributive impacts of carbon taxes, which proved to be a decisive obstacle to their further consideration in public debates. It highlights the gap between partial equilibrium analyses, which are close to the agents' perception of the costs of taxation, and general equilibrium analyses, which better capture its ultimate consequences. It shows that the real impact on households' income distribution is not mechanically determined by the initial energy budgets and their flexibilities but also depends upon the way tax revenues are recycled, and upon the general equilibrium consequences of the reform thus defined. The comparison of three tax-recycling schemes, modelled in a general equilibrium framework applied to 2004 France, demonstrates the existence of trade-offs between aggregate impacts on GDP and employment, the consumption of the low-income classes, and a neutralisation of distributive impacts. Two more recycling schemes allow to outline a space for a compromise between the equity and efficiency criteria

Économie d'une fiscalité carbone en France - Rapport d'étude réalisée avec le soutien de l'ADEME et de la CFDT‐IRES

Cette étude offre une vision d'ensemble des enjeux de mise en oeuvre et d'évolution d'une fiscalité carbone en France. Elle s'applique à ne pas dissocier son évaluation des grands défis économiques et sociaux à venir et montre qu'un recours à la taxation du carbone offre sur le long terme plus de marges de manoeuvre qu'elle n'en supprime. Sans aller jusqu'aux détails précis de sa mise en ouvre, elle vise à clarifier les mécanismes mis en jeu et à apprécier, pour un même ensemble de critères, les impacts chiffrés de plusieurs dispositifs. Il apparaît que les dispositifs qui offrent le plus de marge de manoeuvre pour concilier les objectifs de climat, croissance, emploi, distribution des revenus et compétitivité des entreprises, combinent deux modes de redistribution du produit de la taxe carbone : d'un côté, en finançant des mesures compensatoires pour les populations et les activités les plus impactées, de l'autre, comme ressource alternative au financement des retraites pour contenir la hausse future des cotisations sociales. La conclusion majeure est que, sans une telle réforme, qui engage la négociation sociale au-delà des seuls enjeux climatiques, il sera difficile, au cours du prochain demi-siècle, de réaliser un découplage drastique entre émissions de gaz à effet de serre et croissance.taxe carbone, double dividende, inégalités

Hybrid Input-Output tables for CGE model calibration and consequences on energy policy analysis

International audienceHybrid modelling approaches are increasingly used to bridge the historical gap between the bottom-up (BU) and top-down (TD) approaches to energy/economy/environment (E3) modelling. By nature, they require a substantial effort of harmonisation between national accounts and energy balance data. For most computable general equilibrium (CGE) models defined at the scale of a given country, efforts have been made to reconcile those data. But the methods being used and their impacts on the empirical information are generally poorly documented. Models domains corresponding to multiple countries rely on hybrid datasets whose characteristics and methods of production are not explored in details. Such an exploration is required, however, because different hybridisation techniques have different impacts on key empirical features that are important for policy evaluation. After reviewing the literature on hybridisation methods, this paper proposes an innovative procedure for building hybrid Input-Output matrices at the scale of a country, and illustrates it with data for France. Compared to existing methods, this procedure includes information about energy flows, prices and quantities coming from energy statistics, without alteration on this data. All this information is then introduce within a consistent social accounting framework. The impact of this method is illustrated in a standard Capital-Labour-Energy (‘KLEM’) CGE model. The welfare costs of the same price-induced energy policy are evaluated, keeping the same behavioural structural assumptions and parameters. The model is alternatively calibrated either using our hybrid matrices or unmodified original input-output data from national accounts. This comparison shows that the model calibrated on hybridised data produce systematically lower welfare costs estimates, when targeting energy reduction alternatively on firm consumptions and household consumptions

Making Carbon Pricing Work

Carbon-pricing initiatives are spreading at an unprecedented rate, but a considerable gap remains between actual prices and those required to achieve ambitious climate change mitigation. This perspective shows that much of this gap could be closed by enhancing the public’s acceptance of carbon pricing through the effective use of the substantial revenues raised. We synthesize findings regarding the use of carbon revenues both from recent behavioral and political studies as well as from economic analyses of equity and efficiency. We then compare real-world carbon pricing regimes with insights derived from theory. We find that uniform lump-sum recycling of carbon revenues to citizens is favored among behavioral and political studies that emphasize the importance of distributional fairness, revenue salience, political trust, and policy stability amid partisan changes in government. It is also successfully employed in several real-world recycling schemes, although alternative uses of revenues such as green spending may be appropriate in different national contexts

Making Carbon Pricing Work

Carbon-pricing initiatives are spreading at an unprecedented rate, but a considerable gap remains between actual prices and those required to achieve ambitious climate change mitigation. This perspective shows that much of this gap could be closed by enhancing the public’s acceptance of carbon pricing through the effective use of the substantial revenues raised. We synthesize findings regarding the use of carbon revenues both from recent behavioral and political studies as well as from economic analyses of equity and efficiency. We then compare real-world carbon pricing regimes with insights derived from theory. We find that uniform lump-sum recycling of carbon revenues to citizens is favored among behavioral and political studies that emphasize the importance of distributional fairness, revenue salience, political trust, and policy stability amid partisan changes in government. It is also successfully employed in several real-world recycling schemes, although alternative uses of revenues such as green spending may be appropriate in different national contexts

euHCVdb: the European hepatitis C virus database

The hepatitis C virus (HCV) genome shows remarkable sequence variability, leading to the classification of at least six major genotypes, numerous subtypes and a myriad of quasispecies within a given host. A database allowing researchers to investigate the genetic and structural variability of all available HCV sequences is an essential tool for studies on the molecular virology and pathogenesis of hepatitis C as well as drug design and vaccine development. We describe here the European Hepatitis C Virus Database (euHCVdb, ), a collection of computer-annotated sequences based on reference genomes. The annotations include genome mapping of sequences, use of recommended nomenclature, subtyping as well as three-dimensional (3D) molecular models of proteins. A WWW interface has been developed to facilitate database searches and the export of data for sequence and structure analyses. As part of an international collaborative effort with the US and Japanese databases, the European HCV Database (euHCVdb) is mainly dedicated to HCV protein sequences, 3D structures and functional analyses

Fiscalité carbone et progrès social. Application au cas français

The thesis revisits the debates on the socio-economic impacts of a carbon tax reform and the controversies over the choice of a scheme. A diagnosis is primarily based on a review of a French failure (the carbon tax of Nicolas Sarkozy, 2009-2010). It distinguishes between problems of political acceptability and limits of economic analysis to define the scheme. The importance of the discussion about the use made off the tax proceeds is stressed. This point is indeed behind the political problems and determines the economic and legal consistency of the project with regard to the objectives (environment, equity, competitiveness). It shows that existing analytical tools can be improved to enable social dialogue and support collective bargaining on this point. A numerical simulation tool is then proposed and built. It can be used i) to compare the impacts of different schemes on various indicators (CO2, activity, employment, inequality, poverty, public debt), ii) to describe several views about how the economy works and will work in the future, and iii) to link the design of a climate policy with the other challenges of a tax reform (deficits reduction, funding of pensions). This tool is then used to revisit the controversy, clarify the tradeoffs and identify the best ways to find a compromise. It appears that the carbon taxation can provide co-benefits from a socio-economic viewpoint (for activity and employment, inequalities and deficits reduction). But this is not automatic: Some sensitive political choices must be made with regard to, not only the objective of climate action, but also the other challenges of a public finance and fiscal policy reform.La thèse revisite les débats sur les conséquences socioéconomiques et le choix des modalités d'une fiscalité carbone. Un diagnostic est d'abord tiré de l'examen d'un échec français (la taxe carbone de N. Sarkozy, 2009-2010). Il distingue les problèmes d'acceptabilité politique, des limites de l'analyse économique pour définir les dispositifs. Il souligne l'importance de la discussion sur l'usage des recettes de la taxe, car ce point cristallise les difficultés politiques et conditionne la cohérence économique et juridique du projet au regard des objectifs recherchés (environnement, équité, compétitivité). Il montre que les outils d'analyse peuvent être améliorés pour accompagner cette discussion. Un outil de simulation numérique est ensuite proposé et construit. Il permet de comparer les performances de dispositifs sur divers indicateurs (émissions de CO2, activité, emploi, inégalités, pauvreté, endettement), de décrire plusieurs points de vue sur le fonctionnement de l'économie (actuelle et future), et de lier dans une démarche prospective le dossier climatique aux autres dossiers de réforme des prélèvements obligatoires (maîtrise des déficits, financement des retraites). L'outil est enfin utilisé pour revisiter les controverses, clarifier les arbitrages et identifier les meilleures pistes de compromis. Il apparaît qu'une fiscalité carbone peut offrir des co-bénéfices socioéconomiques (pour l'activité et l'emploi, la réduction des inégalités, la maîtrise des déficits). Mais cela n'est pas automatique, des choix politiques sensibles doivent être faits ; ces dernier portent, au-delà du seul dossier 'climat', sur la gestion d'une réforme générale des finances publiques

Carbon Tax and Equity. The Importance of Policy Design

International audienc

Fiscalité Carbone, Lubie d’écolo ou idée d’avenir ?

International audienc