Glaeser: Tax Credits for Home Heating Won't Help

Glimp professor of economics Edward L. Glaeser doesn't like the Home Energy Affordability Tax Relief Act, which would give each American household a tax credit for a third of the household's energy costs...

Glimp professor of economics Edward L. Glaeser doesn't like the Home Energy Affordability Tax Relief Act, which would give each American household a tax credit for a third of the household's energy costs, up to a total of $500.

"High prices, painful as they may be, do more to encourage energy conservation than replaying every one of President Carter's sweater-clad exhortations to turn down the heat," he wrote in an op-ed that ran in the Boston Globe last week. "Tax credits for home energy use reward people for using more fuel. If anything, the environmental consequences of carbon emissions and the strategic repercussions of importing Middle Eastern oil suggest that lawmakers should be raising, not lowering, taxes on energy."

You might also like

Harvard Panel Debunks the Population Implosion Myth

Public health professors parse the evidence surrounding falling U.S. birth rates.

A New Narrative of Civil Rights

Political philosopher Brandon Terry’s vision of racial progress

Harvard Economist Nicole Maestas on Aging and Health Policy

The Harvard health economist not afraid to get in the weeds

Most popular

Bringing Korean Stories to Life

Composer Julia Riew writes the musicals she needed to see.

How MAGA Went Mainstream at Harvard

Trump, TikTok, and the pandemic are reshaping Gen Z politics.

Shakespeare’s Greatest Rival

Without Christopher Marlowe, there might not have been a Bard.

Explore More From Current Issue

Two women in traditional kimonos, one lighting a cigarette, in a scene from Apart from You.

Harvard Film Archive Spotlights Japanese Director Mikio Naruse

A retrospective of the filmmaker’s works, from Floating Clouds to Flowing

Johnston Gate

Your Views on Harvard’s Standoff, Antisemitism, and More

Readers comment on the controversial July-August cover, authoritarianism, and scientific research.

Illustration of college students running under a large red "MAGA" hat while others look on with some skeptisim.

How MAGA Went Mainstream at Harvard

Trump, TikTok, and the pandemic are reshaping Gen Z politics.