Research Center of the Central China for Economic and Social Development, Nanchang University, Nanchang, China.
School of Economics and Management, Nanchang University, Nanchang, China.
Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2021 Dec;28(45):64830-64847. doi: 10.1007/s11356-021-15615-6. Epub 2021 Jul 27.
In this paper, we estimate the price and income elasticities for gasoline demand in selected energy gluttons-China, India, USA, Russia, and Japan. Specifically, we employ a time-varying parameter approach which adequately deals with potential parameter instabilities and nonlinearities and effectively captures price and income elasticity variations over time, with each time period having its own set of coefficients. Our empirical findings reveal the following: gasoline consumption is price-inelastic and income-inelastic, there are movements in both the price and income elasticities, and the movements generally correspond with business cycle patterns of each of the countries; overall, sensitivity to price and income changes increase during periods of economic crises. Constant elasticity models overestimate price and income elasticities, and income is predominantly more elastic than price. Our conclusion is that policy mechanisms that are price-based such as gasoline taxes are likely to be unsuccessful in achieving consumption-cum-pollution reduction objectives in the energy gluttons. Such policies may, however, be effective if they ensure that gasoline prices rise at a greater rate than income. Such policies may also be useful for revenue-raising purposes.
本文估计了中国、印度、美国、俄罗斯和日本这五个能源消费大国的汽油需求的价格和收入弹性。具体而言，我们采用了时变参数方法，该方法充分考虑了潜在的参数不稳定性和非线性，有效地捕捉了随时间变化的价格和收入弹性变化，每个时间段都有自己的一组系数。我们的实证研究结果表明：汽油消费是缺乏价格弹性和收入弹性的，价格和收入弹性都存在变动，这些变动通常与各国的经济周期模式相对应；总体而言，在经济危机期间，对价格和收入变化的敏感性会增加。常数弹性模型高估了价格和收入弹性，而且收入的弹性通常大于价格。我们的结论是，在能源消费大国中，基于价格的政策机制，如汽油税，不太可能成功地实现消费和污染减排目标。然而，如果这些政策能确保汽油价格的上涨速度快于收入增长，那么这些政策可能会更有效。这些政策也可能有助于增加收入。
