A macroeconomic analysis of the public investments in European combined transport

Abstract

Intermodal transport has been recognized as a priority by the European Union, that has defined different budget allocations of investments to improve the shifting from road to intermodal transport, which is more sustainable. In this context, the main aim of the paper is to discuss the macroeconomic effects, in terms of economic growth, welfare and trade, of these public investments for combined transport, which aspects have been neglected in literature. A multi-country computable general equilibrium model has been used. Themain results have been that the European Union benefits from these investments, but at international level, USA and Japan would lose in terms of welfare. Furthermore, the welfare change has been decomposed in its components and the results show that the trade effects are higher than the allocative effects. The robustness of the results has been tested over time and by a sensitivity analysis of the exchange rate.