December 29, 2006

Tax rates on energy usage: An adjustment of the GTAP-6 rates

The tax rates of deliveries of energy products to industry and households in the GTAP-6 database are in some countries for the year 2001 rather different from the ones reported by the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Especially the rates for deliveries to industry seem to be too high. This paper shows the rates derived from IEA with observations from Energy Prices and Taxes statistics and documents a new dataset with adjusted tax rates. Comparison with the GTAP-6 database reveals some striking differences. The rates are further adjusted for petroleum and coal products after comparing the implied taxes calculated as a percentage of GDP with the OECD Revenue Statistics. For other energy carriers we have not corrected the rates any further