Leakage, Welfare, and Cost-Effectiveness of Carbon Policy
Kathy Baylis, Don Fullerton, Daniel H. Karney
American Economic Review · 2013 · Volume 103 · Issue 3
Abstract
We extend the model of Fullerton, Karney, and Baylis (2012) to explore cost-effectiveness of unilateral climate policy in the presence of leakage. We ignore the welfare gain from reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and focus on the welfare cost of the emissions tax or permit scheme. Whereas that prior paper solves for changes in emissions quantities and finds that leakage may be negative, we show here that all cases with negative leakage in that model are cases where a unilateral carbon tax results in a welfare loss. With positive leakage, however, a unilateral policy can improve welfare.
Keywords
Climate, Natural Disasters, Global Warming, Environmental Economics: Government Policy
Enable JavaScript for citation tools and additional paper interactions.