Article
Five Myths About Carbon Pricing
Oxford Review of Economic Policy
(2023)
Abstract
While carbon pricing, in general, and carbon taxes, in particular, are popular with economists, they are subject to considerable misunderstanding among policy-makers and the public. In this paper I consider and refute five myths about carbon taxes: (i) that a carbon price will hurt economic growth; (ii) that carbon pricing will kill jobs; (iii) that a carbon tax and cap-and-trade program have the same economic impacts; (iv) that we can’t achieve carbon reduction targets with a carbon tax; and (v) that carbon pricing is regressive. I then discuss implications for policy-making.
Keywords
- carbon tax,
- carbon pricing,
- climate policy
Disciplines
Publication Date
Winter 2023
Citation Information
Gilbert E. Metcalf. "Five Myths About Carbon Pricing" Oxford Review of Economic Policy Vol. 39 Iss. 4 (2023) Available at: http://works.bepress.com/gilbert_metcalf/135/