Skip to main content
Article
Environmental Policies in the Transportation Sector: Taxes, Subsidies, Mandates, Restrictions, and Investment
Economics Working Papers
  • Justin Beaudoin, University of Washington, Tacoma
  • Yuan Chen, University of California, Davis
  • David R. Heres, Centro de Investigacion y Docencia Economicas (CIDE)
  • Khaled H. Kheiravar, University of California, Davis
  • Gabriel E. Lade, Iowa State University
  • Fujin Yi, Nanjing Agricultural University
  • Wei Zhang, Connecticut College
  • C.-Y. Cynthia Lin Lawell, Cornell University
Publication Date
8-15-2018
Number
18012
Abstract

The transportation sector is associated with many negative externalities, including air pollution, global climate change, and traffic congestion. In this paper we discuss several possible policies for addressing the emissions and other environmental externalities from the transportation sector, including taxes, subsidies, mandates, restrictions, and investment. Most economists generally recommend that policy-makers use incentive- (or market-) based instruments as opposed to command and control policies whenever possible. However, various economic and political constraints can preclude policy instruments that would in theory achieve a first-best outcome from being employed, and policy-makers have often implemented alternative policies such as subsidies, mandates, restrictions, and/or investment instead. Our discussion and analysis of these policies draws upon and synthesizes research using theoretical models, behavioral and experimental economics, empirical analyses, and structural econometric modeling.

Version History

Original Release Date: August 15, 2018

Departments
Department of Economics, Iowa State University
File Format
application/pdf
Length
42 pages
Citation Information
Justin Beaudoin, Yuan Chen, David R. Heres, Khaled H. Kheiravar, et al.. "Environmental Policies in the Transportation Sector: Taxes, Subsidies, Mandates, Restrictions, and Investment" (2018)
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/gabriel-lade/10/