From the levy on non reusable plastic containers to the tax on fluorinated greenhouse gases, through waste and incineration taxes, along with many others some of which are regional. a broad suite of charges aimed at safeguarding the environment.
Their main aim should not be financial. They ought to drive environmental protection rather than generate revenue. This is a non financial goal. The objective should not be to collect money but to shape behaviors or activities that affect the environment. If a tax achieves that, it signals progress by reducing pollution and protecting ecosystems, since polluted activities would be discouraged.
These financial instruments tend to worry ordinary people who feel the heavier tax burden, even when explanations are offered. Taxes and public accounts can become political fuel, especially during election cycles.
In practice, much of the environmental tax framework remains less visible to citizens than ordinary taxes, yet it is still passed on to consumers through prices or costs in a legal or economic sense.
Tax war in the election campaign
Over successive elections there has often been a long drought before, a period when climate protection cannot be weaponized in politics because the foundations of environmental policy exist. The protection of the environment is rooted in constitutional principles. When protection becomes a political tool, taxpayers respond with caution.
Taxes are frequently used on the political battlefield, where right and left labels are applied, sometimes loosely. Environmental taxes should be shielded from this political wrestling more than any other policy area, especially when debates wrongly assign them to a particular ideology that does not fit fiscal policy plans.
Among the traditional environmental taxes, the hydrocarbon levy has the most visible impact on citizens. This is a harmonized tax under European Union directives, which set a structure and minimum rates that member states can apply and adjust within their own territory.
As a standard manufacturing tax, it targets hydrocarbon production. Unlike value-added tax, it is imposed at a single stage and can pass to the consumer. The producer collects the tax and transfers it to the buyer through the supply chain, so higher payable amounts translate into higher prices for the final consumer. The more revenue a hydrocarbon tax generates, the more it appears to affect consumer prices.
Thus the question arises about whether fuel taxes truly pursue environmental goals or simply boost revenue. A tax on fuel consumption should ideally be designed to minimize hydrocarbon use while maintaining limited tax collection, and ideally it should reduce pollution from road traffic.
Fuel consumption then raises questions about equity between affluent and less wealthy groups. In practice, the policy may not reflect an actual environmental target if current transport infrastructure forces continued fuel use by many people. In rural or sparsely populated areas, where stopping use of hydrocarbons is not feasible, hydrocarbon taxes affect individuals regardless of wealth or assets.
Such a framework could be seen as aligning with liberal or conservative fiscal approaches that favor indirect taxation, even while environmental taxes are often associated with more progressive or left leaning policies.
The constitutional framework recognizes that non-financial taxes must respect the core principles of tax justice, including generality, economic capacity, equality, progressiveness, and non confiscation. The same considerations apply in European Union analyses, regardless of the stated environmental aims.
A liter of gasoline carries the same tax burden whether it is consumed by a resident of a city or a rural resident. In this political dialogue around taxation, environmental issues tend to be framed more often on the left, though the reality is not always neatly aligned with simple labels in today’s climate policy landscape.