Willing to pay to save the planet? Evaluating support for increased spending on sustainable development and environmentally friendly policies in five countries

PLoS One. 2018 Nov 29;13(11):e0207862. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0207862. eCollection 2018.

Abstract

While the 2016 Paris Agreement is in many ways an important attainment with the potential to represent a milestone in humanity's path towards sustainable development, and avoid thus a potential calamitous and destructive future, the achievement of the goals set in the agreement is a long way off. This paper investigates one of the most important worldwide hurdles frustrating the implementation of the policies required to limit environmental degradation and limit pollution, namely the still insufficient public support for the necessary environmental policies and their associated cost. Using a comparative database generated through an experimental study on tax compliance and policy preferences run in five countries (USA, UK, Italy, Sweden and Romania), I will evaluate five explanatory models of the degree to which people support environmentally friendly policies by accepting higher tax burdens and increased collective solidarity.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Attitude*
  • Decision Making
  • Environmental Policy / economics*
  • Humans
  • Models, Statistical
  • Planets*
  • Sustainable Development / economics*

Grants and funding

Research conducted within the “Willing to pay? Testing Institutionalist Theory with Experiments” ERC Grant agreement no. 295675, coordinated by Prof. Sven Steinmo. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.