The Stern report, which presents the economic consequences of global warming, was commended by Mr. Angel Gurría, secretary general of the OECD. The report by the former chief economist of the World Bank is an inconvenient truth, as is the film of Al Gore. For Antoine de Gaudemar Liberation, "by touching the sore point, the Stern could prove far more effective than the most ardent argument of the planet"

The OECD's work has shown that the use of environmental policy instruments more economically efficient (taxes or tradable emission quotas), it was possible to reduce by 25% the cost of achieving the objectives of environment. Several countries already resorted to such taxes and tradable emission rights: Denmark, Norway and the United Kingdom and implement carbon taxes, Norway and Japan have set up national emissions trading scheme of CO2; the system of emissions trading in the EU has been operating since 2005 and regional arrangements also exist in the United States and Australia.

Beyond international political measures to cope with global warming, which really benefit environmental policies? The concern about the social dimension of environmental policies is not new; the importance of taking into account both the economic, environmental and social aspects of sustainable development was highlighted from the definition of the concept in the "Report Bruntland "1987: analysing the interface-social" environment "is one of the top priorities of the Strategy of the OECD Environment which has led governments to position themselves facing two kinds of social problems:

* Those relating to the distribution of environmental quality among different members of a population (gross inequality).
* Those connected with the distribution of the financial consequences of these policies.

In most cases, it is not possible to draw a clear distinction between financial and environmental consequences of a particular policy. For environmental policies that seek "local public goods", the studies clearly indicate that a change in the quality of the environment will be a strong financial impact (on the price of rents or employment) at the local level. Therefore, the first question is whether the poorest households pay more for it ultimately receive less? Seen from another window, the public policies they are likely not to penalize hardest some people rather than others?

Basically, governments have used three strategies to avoid making support to low-income households a disproportionate share of the cost of environmental policies.

* First, ensure that low-income households do not dedicate a greater percentage of their income than richer households (measure politically incorrect).
* Second, address the problems of distribution by varying rates depending on income.
* Third, exempt certain low-income groups of the whole system.

Building on his earlier work, the OECD has extended its analysis with special attention to the macroeconomic consequences for the employment of environmental policies by:

* Highlighting-to-date information on employment in the sectors related to the environment in the member countries of the OECD.
* Considering the contribution of local initiatives for the environment for sustainable development through their impact on employment.
* Student more funds to the macroeconomic consequences for the employment of environmental policies.
* Assessing the impact on employment policies on climate change.

The results indicate that activities related to the environment in the private, public and tertiary levels have become an important source of employment in many OECD countries. Available data show that the direct employment effects in the area of environmental goods and services vary between 0.4% and 3.0% of total employment in the OECD countries and between 1% and 1.5% in the majority of country.