The Analysis Of Imposition Of Energy Tax From An Economics View

Energy tax, as a vital policy tool, is widely used by developed countries. This policy tool effectively saves energy consumption and induces reasonable energy used. However, there is still no direct energy tax in China. Energy related taxes disperse in many kinds of tax in an indirect way. With the economic booming, demand of energy also has increased dramatically. It is necessary to use economic methods to allocate energy resources efficiently and induce an effective energy consumption. Hence, it is very crucial to research on the imposition of energy tax no matter from theoretical or applied aspects. On one hand, exploring the optimal mechanism of energy tax imposition, finding the optimal tax levy objects, and using the experiences of developed countries can elevate energy consumption efficiency and reduce the environmental pollution and ecological destroy. On another hand, it is very important to understand, analyze and research the relationship between the imposition of energy tax and economic substantial development. Furthermore, government can accelerate the substantial development by an appropriate imposition of energy tax system and try its best to reduce the negative influence of tax on economic entity and consumers.The energy policy of developed countries inspires China's policy establishment. First, developed countries already create a sound energy tax imposition mechanism, including a quantity of energy related taxes to restrain negative externality, such as carbon tax and sulfur tax. The diversified energy related taxes differentiate different objects. Second, the energy tax levy objects are mainly sorts of energy consumption terminal in developed countries. In contrast, they do not levy energy tax on the energy which is intermediate product. It illustrates the principle of tax for the negative externality. Finally, western countries pay special attention for the protection of energy related sectors and industries and insist on the principle of neutral tax burden. The governments try their best to reduce the impact of energy tax imposition on enterprise competition and macroeconomic by a reasonable tax mechanism.As for the phenomena that developed countries only levy energy taxes on the sorts of energy consumption terminal while our country mainly imposes tax on producers, this paper establishes an input-output general equilibrium model by using energy as a key input to analyze the optimal energy tax imposition objects. The government should impose the energy tax when consider the environmental factor. Furthermore, extend the model to contain the energy consumption of householders. When government can distinguish the energy tax handed in by enterprises or ordinary consumers and can use different tax rates, the optimal decision is not imposing energy tax on the energy as intermediate products but levy the energy tax according to the energy as the terminal goods. In contrast, in the case that government cannot differentiate main body of energy consumption, the optimal choice is to levy energy tax on the corporations.In order to have a further analysis on the impact of energy tax on the macroeconomic and three main industries, this paper uses a simulation analysis through CGE model and input-output table. On the macroeconomic side, our model demonstrates the more energy tax, the more incremental cost of carbon dioxide reduction if other things equal. On the industry side, this model illustrates that the production of coal mining and screening sector decreases most fast. The production of industry sector, service and others and agriculture sector decrease sequentially.Through our analysis, this paper summaries another main conclusion that the negative influence of imposition of energy tax on the economic entity is limited. First, due to the substitute relation of the economic body, the imposition of energy tax does not lead to the proportional GDP reduction. Second, the actual carbon tax perhaps is more than nominal carbon tax because of adjusting cost of production and consumption. Obviously, the more adjusting cost, the more actual carbon tax. Hence, the government should reduce other taxes when levy energy tax to keep a neutral tax burden on the economic body.