Tariffs for Urban Water Services in Spain: Household Size and Equity

The purpose of this work is to evaluate the consequences of tariffs that use sliding-scale prices to assess the aggregated consumption of households in terms of equity. Particular attention is paid to special tariffs for larger households. The study analyzes the tariffs that were in effect in Spanish provincial capitals in 2008. The results confirm that there are equity problems associated with the size of the household, particularly regarding large households. Furthermore, the results show that a large part of the special tariffs that have been adopted do not solve that equity problem.