International Symposium in Stockholm September 18

International Symposium in Stockholm
September 18-19, 2014 on:
“Re-Considering Motor Fuel Taxes – Options for Reforming the Taxation of Vehicle
Use and Ownership”
Centre for Transport Studies – KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
In many economies, motor fuel taxes have long been the main instruments for generating tax revenues
from the transport sector. Nowadays they are also rationalized on the grounds of reducing congestion,
carbon emissions, local air pollution, energy dependency, and sometimes accident costs. However, for
several reasons, there is now much debate about reforming or partially replacing these taxes.
First, motor fuel taxes are increasingly complemented by more targeted instruments, including fuel
efficiency and emission rate standards, parking charges, and congestion pricing systems. Second,
alternative fuels (biofuels, natural gas, electricity, etc.) are starting to replace gasoline and diesel and
these new fuels are often left untaxed or even are subsidized. Third, annual vehicle and sales taxes are
commonly differentiated according to the vehicles’ environmental and safety qualities. Lastly, the need
for fiscal consolidation after the crisis has heightened interest in additional revenue sources, not least in
countries that have traditionally subsidized petroleum.
Many of these trends will continue and may accelerate in the future, eroding the principal revenue base
(fossil fuels) of traditional transportation taxes, and confounding the discussion of how externalities
(congestion, climate, air pollution, accidents, road wear and tear) and fiscal needs are best handled in
the transport sector.
This raises a number of important research questions:
1. How well have current fuel taxes satisfied environmental, fiscal, distributional, and other objectives of
concern to policymakers? What are the second best properties of (differentiated) vehicle and sales
taxes?
2. What are the drivers of change in this process? What makes countries introduce other pricing and
regulatory instruments and prevents them from extending and reforming fuel and vehicle taxes? Is this,
for example, the result of tax competition between countries or different levels of government, or a
reluctance to burden motorists?
3. What might be a more effective and/or less costly mix of fiscal and regulatory policies to better
achieve the same objectives? What are the major impediments for this restructuring and how might
they be overcome? Is there a role for earmarking transportation revenues? To what extent can, and
should, road pricing schemes replace or complement fuel taxes at a local or national level, in both
developed and developing countries?
We invite academic contributions worldwide that focus on these research questions and that take a
transport, environmental, energy and/or public finance economics perspective. A selection of papers
presented at the conference will be invited for a special journal issue.
Conference Date and Venue : 18 and 19 September 2014 at Center for Transport Studies, KTH
Stockholm
Registration & Financing: All participants pay their own hotel and travel costs – registration fee is 50
Euro and covers lunches and coffee breaks.
Local administrative contact: Gunilla Appelgren ([email protected])
Program committee: Maria Börjesson (KTH), Jonas Eliasson (KTH), Jan-Eric Nilsson (VTI & KTH), Ian Parry
(IMF), Stef Proost (KTH & KULeuven), Kurt Van Dender (OECD)
Papers (or extended abstract of 1 to 3p) due: May 1st 2014 by e-mail to [email protected]
with subject “fuel tax symposium”
Notification of Acceptance: June 1st 2014
Hotel: A list of available hotels:
Scandic Park, Karlavägen 43, Stockholm
http://www.scandichotels.se/Hotels/Countries/Sverige/Stockholm/Hotels/ScandicPark/?cmpid=ppc&mckv=sun4V6nmd_dc|pcrid|26666176140|kword|%2Bscandic%20%2Bpark|match|
b|plid|&gclid=CLHv-PXFnrwCFYJP3godwk4A6Q
Clarion Collection Hotel Tapto, Jungfrugatan 5, Stockholm
http://hotels.findhotel.se/Hotel/Clarion_Collection_Tapto.htm?gclid=CJzr-pTGnrwCFQhf3god6xQAdg
Elite Hotel Arcadia, Körsbärsvägen 1, Stockholm
http://www.elite.se/sv/hotell/stockholm/arcadia?gclid=COzyi7LGnrwCFQkd3goduF8Ayw

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