The Institutionalization of Environmental Attention in the United States and Denmark: Multiple- versus Single-Venue Systems

The European countries have surpassed the United States with regard to comprehensive and stringent environmental regulation. This policy pattern has become very visible in the international debate about reduction of CO₂ emissions. From a comparative public policy perspective, the recent difference is interesting because it restates the question about policy consequences of political institutions. This article addresses this theoretical question from the perspective of policy agenda-setting theory. We present the argument that while the U.S. political system, with its many "venues" that are relatively open to internal and external competing forces, might be quicker in generating attention to new issues like the environment, the institutionalization of attention is also less strong than in a European parliamentary system. The article substantiates this argument with empirics by comparing attention to and policymaking for environmental issues in the United States to Denmark.     

Discourses in Norwegian Climate Policy: National Action or Thinking Globally?

Norway is often recognised as a pioneer country in environmental politics. Norwegian climate policy has changed considerably during the 1990s. It has evolved from a situation in 1989 where there was a broad consensus round the notion that a national target for stabilisation of CO₂ emissions was the principal instrument for climate change abatement, to a situation at the turn of the century where Norway emerged as one of the most committed supporters of flexible mechanisms, the so-called 'Kyoto mechanisms'. We identify two main discourses in the Norwegian politics of climate change, and label them 'national action' and 'thinking globally'. This paper gives insight into the core elements of these two discourses and how they act as basic knowledge systems when actors put forward standpoints on the climate change issue.     

Carbon Taxation and Policy Labeling: Experience from American States and Canadian Provinces

A vast economics literature embraces taxation of the carbon content of fossil fuels as the superior policy approach for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. However, experience around the world suggests that carbon taxes face exceedingly difficult political hurdles. Federal experience in the United States and in Canada confirms this pattern. This article reviews sub‐federal policy development among American states and Canadian provinces, a great many of which have pursued climate policy development. With one major exception, explicit carbon taxation appears to remain a political nonstarter. At the same time, states and provinces have been placing indirect carbon prices on fossil fuel use through a wide range of policies. These tend to strategically alter labeling, avoiding the terms of “tax” and “carbon” in imposing costs. The article offers a framework for considering such strategies and examines common design features, including direct linkage between cost imposition and fund usage to build political support.     

The Political Importance of Financial Performance

Asset mobility is thought to constrain taxation, as firms with mobile assets can avoid taxation by locating their assets in low-tax jurisdictions. Firms with immobile assets then face higher taxes. By considering the political incentives that accompany widespread financialization, we identify a new limit to the targeting of immobile firms: Publicly traded firms with immobile underlying assets lose more value in financial markets when taxes are increased, as shareholders anticipate that these underlying assets cannot be withheld from taxation. When governments care about this loss in value, their incentive to tax immobile, publicly traded firms declines. Political concern for financial performance therefore limits the extent to which immobile assets can be targeted for taxation. We argue that broad-based participation in the stock market and democratic political institutions increase political concern for financial performance. We discuss the implications of the theory and findings for policy autonomy, firm ownership, and economic voting.     

Worldwide experience in sales taxation: Lessons for North America

Worldwide fiscal experience over the past twenty-five years indicates steady expansion in the political and academic constituency for expenditure taxation, including indirect taxes on consumption. Retail levies have emerged as the preferred method of indirect taxation of consumption, as older, pre-retail sales taxes have proven unsuited to modern economic structures. Increasingly, reform of sales taxation has involved a shift to one particular form of tax, the European Community type of value-added tax (VAT). This consumption tax option is again a topic of policy debate in North America, particularly in Canada where a VAT was under active consideration in 1985.This paper sifts through worldwide experience with broad-based sales taxes to identify lessons for tax policy in North America both in the short and longer-run. It indicates that the reputation of such taxes as regressive instruments may have been much exaggerated, and that in any case methods are available, particularly in Canada, for resolving equity issues in sales taxation. The VAT is shown to have marginal economic and administrative advantages over single-stage federal retail taxes in both Canada and the US. However, these advantages are not nearly so significant as in European countries where the VAT was adopted there. Further, sensible debate over the merits and limitations of the VAT in North America will call for much closer scrutiny of the problems unique to this form of tax. Finally, three political issues that were not significant in Europe will likely have an important bearing on any future choices of sales tax instruments, both in the U.S. and in Canada.     

Attitudes towards Taxation: Ignorant and Incoherent?

The point of departure for this paper is US evidence claiming that citizens do not possess an adequate understanding of the concept of progressive taxation. Using the format of standard survey questions, most respondents preferred progressive taxes. When faced with similar questions framed in concrete terms, a majority rejected progressive taxes. By analysing data from Sweden, it is shown that irrespective of whether abstract or concrete measures are applied, most citizens support progressive taxation. There is no evidence indicating that Swedes in general do not understand the concept of progressive taxation. To explain why US citizens are more ignorant about progressive taxation than Swedish citizens, it is suggested that the Swedish welfare state institutions and the surrounding political environment may be exercising a substantially stronger educational influence on the meaning of redistributive concepts.     

Review Essay: The 'Domestic Politics' Bias in Analyses of CO2 Taxation in the Nordic Countries

This review essay addresses four prominent political science analyses of CO₂-tax reforms in the Nordic countries. Three books on Norway, Finland and Denmark as well as a comparative essay are discussed. Two objections are raised against all of the four contributions. First, all these contributions tend to ignore independent variables related to economic structure as well as external political and economic challenges. Second, there is an absence of comparative designs that could discuss the effects of a broader set of independent variables in a meaningful way.     

Interest group demand for taxation

Researchers have typically ignored the determinants of the tax structure of the public sector. Political scientists have concentrated their analyses on the expenditure side of the public ledgers while economists have avoided the issue by assuming that taxes are exogenously determined. In this paper we have shown that a behavioral model of political interest groups can be employed to gain insights into the political selection of taxes. The theory provides a general complement to the well-documented analysis of special interest demand for public expenditures.Our analysis raises several important policy questions. First, is the influence of interest groups on the determination of tax systems desirable from a public policy perspective? For example, special interest groups dominated by high and middle income individuals may prefer regressive tax systems which reduce their own tax burden. Certainly the impact of interest groups on the well-known regressivity of state and local tax systems is an area worthy of additional investigation.     

The politics of digits: evidence of odd taxation

From the concept of odd pricing, i.e., setting rightmost price digits below a whole number, this paper advances the political counterpart of odd taxation using a panel of Danish municipal taxes. First, the distribution of tax decimals is non-uniform and resembles the distribution of price-endings data. Second, nine-ending and other higher-end decimals are found to be over-represented which echoes odd pricing research. It suggests that incumbents take voters’ biases into account and apply odd taxes to minimize the political costs of taxation while maximizing revenue. Attention should be given to how policy digits are arranged to exploit voters’ cognitive biases.     

Globale Besteuerung und Demokratische Legitimität

The democratic state has been offering the conditions for legitimately levying taxes. Tax revenues have been securing the sovereign’s ability to act, policy aims pursued through taxation have been the outcome of a democratic process and the coercion backed institutions levying taxes have enjoyed the status of democratic legitimacy. But a twofold dynamic challenges this status quo. States are under pressure to address problems to which global taxation offers the most promising response. And phenomena like capital mobility impose constraints on the state’s ability to effectively use the policy instrument of taxation. Under what institutional arrangements could taxation be maintained as a justifiable instrument? And what should future institutional arrangements of public finance look like?     

Why did Argentina and Uruguay decide to pursue a carbon tax? Fiscal reforms and explicit carbon prices

Since 2014, carbon taxes have been spreading in South America. Counterintuitively, while they are primarily considered climate policies, their adoption has been largely driven by causes unrelated to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. The carbon tax policymaking literature has overlooked the causes that trigger the causal mechanisms for adopting carbon taxes and has instead centered on parts of the causal mechanism. Focusing on the very beginning of the process, namely the causes triggering the decision to pursue carbon taxes in Argentina and Uruguay, this study both contributes to the carbon tax policymaking literature and to the burgeoning application of logical Bayesian analysis in qualitative studies. According to previous studies, the pursuit of carbon taxes inherently entails political challenges linked, among others, to its potential regressive impacts and effects on industries, which makes the sudden rise of carbon taxes in Argentina and Uruguay surprising. Based on 26 expert interviews and a desk review, the study applies a logical Bayesian analysis to study potential causes structured around mutually exclusive hypotheses consistent with the carbon tax policymaking literature. It shows that the causes for pursuing carbon taxes in Argentina and Uruguay are not primarily related to mitigation. Instead, Argentina conceived carbon taxation as part of a broader reform of its fiscal system, and Uruguay as a way to make explicit the already high implicit carbon price.     

Elections and the structure of taxation in developing countries

This article analyses the impact of the electoral calendar on the composition of tax revenue (direct versus indirect taxes). It thus represents an extension of traditional political budget-cycle analyses assessing the impact of elections on overall revenue. We appeal to the opportunistic political budget model of Drazen and Eslava (2010) to predict the relationship between taxation structure and elections. Panel data from 56 developing countries over the 1980–2006 period reveals a clear pattern of electorally-related policy interventions. Taking the potential endogeneity of election timing into account, we find robust evidence of lower indirect taxes being applied by incumbent governments in the period just prior to an election. Indirect tax revenue in election years is estimated to be 0.3 GDP percentage points lower than in other years, corresponding to a fall of about 3.4% of the average figure in the sample countries, while there is no such relationship with direct tax revenue.     

Melting Down and Scaling Up: Stabilizing Climate Change by Promoting Private Sector Technology Development

This paper will examine the role the private sector plays in researching, developing, and deploying technology that has the potential to deter or decrease the impacts of global warming. It will explore the degree to which the private sector can have an impact on global warming by focusing on four specific technologies: aircraft engines, wind turbines, solar energy, and clean coal technologies. We will compare the environmental impact of these technologies with the business case for pursuing each, specifically related to profitability and market maturity. We conclude that the business case alone is not sufficiently compelling to stimulate meaningful industry investment in these areas. Consequently, specific government involvement is needed for CO₂ reduction. This analysis will shed light on the role that government must play in order to more effectively engage potential private sector players in the global warming challenge.     

Tax Design and The Meddling Factor: Lessons From Hawaii's Liquor Tax

Tax design decisions are subject to many influences, including economic and political realities. Those who make tax policy at the state level are under constant pressure to modify taxes and tax structures at the margin. In making their decisions, policy makers must assess and weigh the often conflicting advice that results from varying outlooks and interests among, as well as within, the groups providing such input.
Using Hawaii's liquor tax as a case study, this paper illustrates how seemingly innocuous policy meddling can turn a good tax into a bad one. The events that led the Hawaii Legislature to decide to substitute a flawed gallonage levy for a successful ad valorem tax are reviewed. The relative merits of ad valorem and per-unit liquor taxes are discussed. Implications of adoption of the gallonage tax are presented. Finally, the article discusses the reasons why meddling may be attractive to both taxpayers and those who levy the tax, and it concludes that tax design criteria should include disincentives to meddle as a reasonable principle of taxation.     

Taxation and local government accountability in a clientelist context: Colombia

Increasing the accountability of local government is an important objective of decentralisation. One way to achieve greater accountability is to enhance the reliance of local governments on locally raised taxes. Property taxes are a prime source of increased revenue for local governments. However, it is difficult to levy them effectively in clientelist political systems, like that of Colombia. Recent reforms there have increased the capacity of municipal governments to raise revenue through property taxation. Giving responsibility for assessments of property values to an independent national agency has been especially useful. Municipal government finances are now to some degree independent and protected from the influence of clientelistic political parties. However continuing problems include: the reluctance of mayors to enforce taxation liabilities; the obstacles to opening local political debates on taxation; and the problems faced by national governments in trying to monitor municipal revenues and expenditures. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Taxing Higher Incomes: What Makes the High-Income Earners Consent to More Progressive Taxation in Latin America?

When do high-income earners get ‘on board’ with the fiscal contract and accept paying a larger share of the tax burden? Progressive taxes perform particularly poorly in developing countries. We argue that the common opposition of the affluent to more progressive taxation is not merely connected to administrative limitations to coercively enforce compliance, but also to the uncertainty that high-income earners associate with the returns to taxes. Because coercion is not an option, there is a need to convince high-income earners to ‘invest’ in the public system via taxes. Trust in institutions is decisive for the fiscal contract. Expecting that paid contributions will be used in a sensible manner, high-income earners will be more supportive of progressive income taxation. We study tax composition preferences of a cross-section of Latin American countries using public opinion data from LAPOP for 2012. Findings reveal that higher levels of trust in political institutions strongly mitigate the opposition of the affluent towards more progressive taxation.     

Durkheim and the Reflexive Condition of Modernity

Abstract

In this essay, Durkheim's work is approached from a double vantage point. One vantage point looks at Durkheim's work with a post-classical attitude that inter sects the ontological recasting of the social in the work of Castoriadis. It is in the context of social opening that will concentrate on Durkheim's work as it presents a model of reflexivity that concentrates on the historical development of the modern period. Durkheim's model of reflexivity also opens onto the other vantage point of political modernity, which is viewed as a particular constellation of the circulation of power, especially in nation-states, open forms of reflexivity, and democracy, in contrast to another political modernity that revolves around closed socially reflexive forms of totalitarianism and terrorism. Durkheim's work can be a fruitful point of departure for an analysis of political modernity because his theorisation occurs in a way that opens onto the historical development of its mode of reflexivity.     

A Different Carbon Tax: The Sustainable Green Tariff

Two heated current political arguments focus on carbon taxes and tariffs. This essay will develop an argument for linking carbon emissions with tariffs, through a tax on goods entering a country based on the method of transport and distance traveled, rather than based on the country of origin or category of the product. The result would be to encourage more sustainable local production, to reduce currently externalized costs of carbon emissions, to generate new tax revenues to fund reductions in regressive social insurance taxes, and to provide benefits for those adversely affected by carbon emissions.     

Corporate lobbying and political contributions and their effects on tax avoidance

This study looks at the impact of U.S. lobbying and political contributions on taxes avoided by U.S. publicly traded corporations. Previous research provides mixed conclusions about the effects when examined separately. Looking at political contributions and lobbying contributions simultaneously displays the larger picture. I find that lobbying expenditures and political contributions both lead to lower future taxes, but those political contributions are more effective in reducing taxes paid from what would be expected given the federal statutory rate. This study contributes to the literature in several ways. First, it provides empirical evidence on the positive effects of lobbying contributions and political contributions on taxes avoided. Second, the results of this study are particularly useful for future research following the U.S. Citizens United ruling that affects corporate lobbying and political contributions. Third, differing from previous research, I build a simultaneous equation model to jointly determine the link among lobbying contributions, political contributions, and taxes avoided addressing the endogeneity issues of those relationships. These insights can help firms, policy makers, and public affairs researchers understand the connection between contributions and tax avoidance.     

Public Attitudes towards Taxation: Sweden 1981–1997

Claims have been raised from different perspectives that the welfare state suffers from eroding public support. From an examination of public attitudes towards taxation in Sweden by utilising survey data spanning the period 1981–1997, it is concluded that no long-term trend of increased tax discontent can be distinguished. There are, however, some indications that discontent with taxation has increased during the most recent years. Social conflicts over the preferred distribution and levels of taxes vary in intensity over time, but are foremost structured by class, income, and, to a lesser extent, sector of employment. It is argued that the observed attitude patterns can to some extent be understood as responses to changes in tax and welfare policy.