Does Pricing Carbon Mitigate Climate Change? Firm-Level Evidence from the European Union Emissions Trading System
利用行政数据，研究发现欧盟排放交易体系使受监管的制造业企业二氧化碳排放减少14-16%，且未导致经济活动收缩，企业通过投资降低排放强度而非外包。
Abstract In theory, market-based regulatory instruments correct market failures at least cost. However, evidence on their efficacy remains scarce. Using administrative data, we estimate that, on average, the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS)—the world’s first and largest market-based climate policy—induced regulated manufacturing firms to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 14–16% with no detectable contractions in economic activity. We find no evidence of outsourcing to unregulated firms or markets; instead, firms made targeted investments, reducing the emissions intensity of production. These results indicate that the EU ETS induced global emissions reductions, a necessary and sufficient condition for mitigating climate change. We show that the absence of any negative economic effects can be rationalized in a model where pricing the externality induces firms to make fixed-cost investments in energy-saving capital that reduce marginal variable costs.