No abstract

This paper investigates the effects of enterprise environmental governance under low-carbon pilot policies in China with a difference in differences (DID) design. In examining the development of these policies, we focus on exploring their effects on sulfur dioxide emissions of heavily polluting enterprises based on prefectural city- and firm-level data. Overall, the policies significantly increased enterprise sulfur dioxide emission, and the underlying reason being that investments in carbon dioxide emissions control crowded out investment in sulfur dioxide emission control in enterprises in low-carbon pilot regions. We also find that the implementation of low-carbon pilot policies resulted in greater sulfur dioxide emission from state-owned enterprises and enterprises in western regions than from non-state-owned enterprises and those in eastern regions. It is further found that fiscal decentralization and the associated mediating effect of market segmentation promote enterprises’ carbon dioxide emissions control and inhibit their sulfur dioxide emission control. This study helps us re-examine the overall environmental effects of low-carbon policies and has implications for the revision and improvement of environmental governance policies in developing countries.

No abstract

This paper investigates the effects of enterprise environmental governance under low-carbon pilot policies in China with a difference in differences (DID) design. In examining the development of these policies, we focus on exploring their effects on sulfur dioxide emissions of heavily polluting enterprises based on prefectural city- and firm-level data from 2003-2014. Overall, the policies significantly increased enterprise SO2 emissions, and the underlying reason being that investments in CO2 control crowded out investment in SO2 control in enterprises in low-carbon pilot regions. We also find that the implementation of low-carbon pilot policies resulted in greater SO2 emissions from state-owned enterprises and enterprises in western regions than from non-state-owned enterprises and those in eastern regions. It is further found that fiscal decentralization and the associated mediating effect of market segmentation promote enterprises' CO2 control and inhibit their SO2 control. This study helps us re-examine the overall environmental effects of low-carbon policies and has implications for the revision and improvement of environmental governance policies in developing countries.

Strict environmental regulations may change the behavioral decisions of rms. Based on the exogenous impact of the Chinese Central Government's inclusion of environmental performance in the assessment targets of municipal o cials in 2007, this study uses the difference-in-difference method to explore the impact of environmental regulations on employee income. We nd that (1) environmental regulations will signi cantly reduce the average wage level of employees in polluting industries and have no signi cant impact on nonpolluting industries. (2) This effect is more pronounced in eastern China, where environmental regulations are more stringent, and in areas where political promotion incentives are stronger. (3) Mechanistic analysis nds that environmental regulations will affect employee income by increasing costs and constraining nancing. ( 4) More importantly, we nd that the decline in the average wage level of rms is mainly due to the decline in the average wage level of ordinary employees, and the average wage level of management has not decreased signi cantly, which means that environmental regulations have expanded social income inequality. Our ndings contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the effectiveness of the implementation of environmental regulatory policies and economic cost issues.