Summary
This 2021 policy analysis by Funke and colleagues examines whether current meat prices adequately reflect societal costs from health, environmental and animal welfare externalities. The authors develop a framework for calculating optimal taxation levels that would internalise these hidden costs whilst accounting for regressive distributional impacts. The work integrates economic theory with empirical evidence on meat production's externalities to inform evidence-based policy design.
UK applicability
The framework and methodology are directly applicable to UK policy design, particularly as the UK government considers fiscal instruments for food system reform. The findings could inform development of meat taxation or subsidy restructuring, though UK-specific epidemiological and environmental cost estimates would strengthen application to domestic policy contexts.
Key measures
Estimated optimal tax rates on meat products; monetised externalities from health impacts, greenhouse gas emissions, and animal welfare; distributional effects across income groups
Outcomes reported
The study developed a framework for estimating optimal meat tax rates by quantifying externalities across health, environmental and animal welfare domains. It assessed how taxation could internalise these costs whilst considering distributional impacts on different population groups.
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