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Corporate environmental responsibility (CER) has become a critical factor for measuring the competitiveness of firms in China, and environmental subsidies may be a catalyst for promoting firms’ CER. This study uses data from Chinese A-share listed firms during 2010–2020. Using the instrumental variable two-stage least squares (IV-2SLS) method, we found that environmental subsidies significantly improve corporate environmental performance but have no significant impact on the disclosure and governance of pollution emissions. We find that environmental subsidies are better for chemical and energy firms with high pollution levels, provide incentives for non-state-owned firms to improve CER and that their effect in western and eastern China is better than that in the central region. We also found that corporate social responsibility plays a moderating role in environmental subsidies that affect CER. Finally, this study finds that environmental subsidies may crowd out corporate investments to improve environmental performance. Based on the above results, we provide the corresponding policy suggestions.

Using the data from seven waves of China Health and Nutrition Survey questionnaires, this study investigates the factors associated with underemployment by measuring it using multidimensional indicators and the effect of underemployment on hourly wages in China. We find that male workers have a lower probability of underemployment than female workers. The underemployment rate of men has increased with age. As for women, the underemployment rate does not significantly change with age, considering corrections for selectivity bias. Furthermore, the effect of underemployment on the hourly wages of workers is robustly significant and negative for both males and females.