Environmental taxation in the EU - analysis, challenges and the future

In this paper, the authors intend to show that environmental taxes are an economic instrument that entirely supports the principles of sustainable development and has impact on balanced improvement of all its four pillars (economic, ecological, social, and institutional). Environmental taxes provide a flexible and cost-effective means for reinforcing the polluter-pays principle and for reaching environmental policy objectives. Enforcement of environmental taxes (and penalties) simultaneously generates multiple values—it stimulates ecologically acceptable production, generates budget revenue, and stimulates socially responsible behavior. The subject of the analysis is determination of environmental taxes in the European Union (EU) member states in total amount and as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), as well as monitoring of their trend in the period 2005–2010. To obtain a broad picture, results collected for EU-27 region have been compared with data for sample countries worldwide, including Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS) countries. The revenue from environmental taxes in the EU-27 is not negligible, amounting to about 3% of total revenues. The highest tax revenue as a percent of GDP was noted in Denmark—9% on average. Environmentally related revenues and their percent of GDP in sample countries reported diverse results. In the USA, China, and India, environmentally related revenue as a percent of GDP stood at around 1%, with a downward trend in time. The highest tax revenue as a percent of GDP was recorded in Turkey, Russia, South Africa, and Brazil, 4% on average, with an upward trend in time. However, increasing revenues from environmental taxes should be interpreted with caution. The increases may be caused by the introduction of new taxes or an increase in tax rates, or alternatively may be linked to an increase in the tax base.