The distributive effects of public law 92-500

The large commitment of government resources for environmental protection has prompted concern for the ultimate fiscal incidence of environmental programs, including the federal wastewater treatment grant program. An earlier study of EPA Region VII (Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, and Nebraska) concluded that the federal grants are likely to redistribute income from the middle income classes to primarily the upper income classes. Using a similar methodology, this study shows that for the Boston metropolitan area, there is a substantial redistribution from upper to lower and middle income groups.