Are NIMBY'S commuters?

This paper considers a metropolitan area where residents can commute between several jurisdictions. These residents show NIMBY behavior (Not-In-My-Backyard). They try to preserve their living quality by pushing their polluting economic activity to the neighboring jurisdictions, while keeping their labor income as commuters. This induces a race-to-the-top among jurisdictions. Fiercer competition due to a higher number of jurisdictions intensifies this race-to-the-top; commuting costs, pollution taxes, payroll taxes and bigger jurisdictions increase rather than decrease the incentive for more pollution.Commuting, NIMBY, inter-jurisdictional competition, environmental federalism

Environmental Tax Reform with Vertical Tax Externalities in a Federal State

The paper studies a regional environmental tax reform in a federal state. In a model with immobile labour, mobile capital and mobile polluting input in the production function, one region increases its pollution taxes and recycles the excess tax revenues by lowering either pre-existing distorting labour or capital taxes. This choice determines whether the non-environmental efficiency of the regional tax system improves or gets worse. Moreover, the regional tax reform changes the level of the federal budget through the vertical tax externality effect. We illustrate the magnitude of the different effects with simulations for a country with only 2 regions (Belgium) and a country with 50 regions (US).Tax Reform, Tax externality, Federalism, Tax Burden, Capital Mobility

Environmental tax reform with vertical tax externalities.

The paper studies a regional environmental tax reform in a federal state. A region unilaterally improves the environmental quality by increasing its energy taxes. The regional government recycles the excess tax revenues by lowering either pre-existing distorting labor or capital taxes. This regional tax reform causes a vertical tax externality in the federal budget. We show how the nature of this externality depends on the environmental goal, the tax-recycling scenario, the initial local and federal tax shares, and the relative importance of the reforming region in the federal state. Simulations illustrate the effects for Belgium and US.Tax reform; Vertical Tax Externality; Federalism;

Environmental Tax Reform with Vertical Tax Externalities

The paper studies a regional environmental tax reform in a federal state. A region unilaterally improves the environmental quality by increasing its energy taxes. The regional government recycles the excess tax revenues by lowering either pre-existing distorting labor or capital taxes. This regional tax reform causes a vertical tax externality in the federal budget. We show how the nature of this externality depends on the environmental goal, the tax-recycling scenario, the initial local and federal tax shares, and the relative importance of the reforming region in the federal state. Simulations illustrate the effects for Belgium and US.Tax Reform; Vertical Tax Externality; Federalism

Optimal Location of New Forests in a Suburban Area

In this paper we develop a methodology to select a combination of forest sites that maximizes net social benefits taking into account restrictions on the total surface/size of new forest land. We use GIS technology to estimate for each site the major cost and benefit elements including lost agricultural output, timber and hunting values, carbon sequestration, non-use and recreation benefits. Special emphasis is placed on the recreational value of a potential site as this raises two issues. First, the recreation benefits of a base site estimated via the travel cost method need to be transferred to all potential sites. Second, the recreation benefit of each potential site depends on the existing sites and on the other sites that are in the selection. We show that the same ‘amount’ of afforestation (i.e. the same total surface divided into multiple sites at varying locations) creates a wide range of potential net social benefits due to the role of a varying set of recreation substitutes.We show that the net social benefit of new forest combinations respecting the area constraints may differ up to a factor 21. The substitution effect between forests, both new and existing, turned out to be the dominant factor in the benefit estimation. Compared to the existing literature, our paper improves the methodology by working with realistically feasible sites rather than grid sites, by including the complex recreation substitution effects between potential sites and by including all costs and benefits of afforestation bringing the analysis closer to a real cost benefit analysis.

Optimal location of new forests in a suburban region

This paper looks at the optimal location of new forests in a suburban region under area constraints. The GIS-based methodology takes into account use benefits such as timber, hunting, carbon sequestration and recreation, non-use benefits (both bequest and existence values), opportunity costs of converting agricultural land, as well as planting and management costs of the new forest. The recreation benefits of new forest sites are estimated using function transfer techniques. We show that the net social benefit of the total afforestation project may vary up to a factor 6, depending on the forest sites that are selected. We show that the recreation value of a forest site varies considerably with the available substitutes.Benefit transfer, travel cost analysis, cost-benefit analysis, forest recreation, Geographical Information Systems (GIS)

Optimal location of new forests in a suburban area

This paper looks for the optimal location of new forests in a suburban area under area constraints. The GIS-based methodology takes into account timber, hunting, carbon sequestration, non-use and recreation benefits and opportunity costs of converting agricultural land, as well as planting and management costs of the new forest. The recreation benefits of new forest sites are estimated using function transfer techniques. We show that the net social benefit of new forest combinations respecting the area constraints may differ up to a factor 21. The substitution effect between forests, both new and existing, turned out to be the dominant factor in the benefit estimation.Benefit transfer, travel cost analysis, cost-benefit analysis, forest recreation, Geographical Information Systems (GIS)

Optimal location of new forests in a suburban region.

This paper looks at the optimal location of new forests in a suburban region under area constraints. The GIS-based methodology takes into account use benefits such as timber, hunting, carbon sequestration and recreation, non-use benefits (both bequest and existence values), opportunity costs of converting agricultural land, as well as planting and management costs of the new forest. The recreation benefits of new forest sites are estimated using function transfer techniques. We show that the net social benefit of the total afforestation project may vary up to a factor 6, depending on the forest sites that are selected. We show that the recreation value of a forest site varies considerably with the available substitutes.Benefit transfer; Travel cost analysis; Cost-benefit analysis; Forest recreation; Geographical Information Systems (GIS);

Impact of low oil prices on the EU economy

The report describes the importance of oil for the EU economy and analyses the potential economic effects that current low oil prices since mid-2014 may have in the EU28 economy. Further it assesses how the current oil price decrease may evolve up to 2020 and the consequences for global oil consumption. The analysis shows that a decrease of the oil price from US$100 to US$50 may lead to a GDP gain of about 0.7%, both on a global level and in the EU28, driven by private consumption and investment. The global gains are not evenly distributed. Net oil importing countries gain, whereas oil exporting countries lose. The analysis mainly focuses on the EU28 and it shows that the more oil-intensive countries and sectors gain more than the rest of the economy. A 50% decrease of the oil price may generate up to 3 million additional jobs (1.3% of the total labour force). Interestingly, oil-intensive sectors do not necessarily improve their competitiveness vis-à-vis their competitors in other regions, as non-EU producers may be less energy efficient and therefore benefit more from low oil prices.JRC.J.1-Economics of Climate Change, Energy and Transpor