Regulatory Federalism and Environmental Protection in the United States

List, John A.; Gerking, Shelby D.

doi:10.1111/0022-4146.00183

Cited by 122 publications

(80 citation statements)

References 15 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…The debate continues whether fiscal decentralization will improve or deteriorate environmental quality [13][14][15][16]. Environmental federalism held the opinion that the local governments would pursue economic development at the price of heavy pollution emissions when the spillover effect 2 Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society was taken into account; that is, the impact of fiscal decentralization on the quality of environment was negative [17].…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Socioeconomic Drivers of Environmental Pollution in China: A Spatial Econometric Analysis

Liu

Chen

Wei

2017

Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper studies the environmental pollution and its impacts in China using prefecture-level cities and municipalities data. Moran’sI, the widely used spatial autocorrelation index, provides a fairly strong pattern of spatial clustering of environmental pollution and suggests a fairly high stability of the positive spatial correlation. To investigate the driving forces of environmental pollution and explore the relationship between fiscal decentralization, economic growth, and environmental pollution, spatial Durbin model is used for this analysis. The result shows that fiscal decentralization of local unit plays a significant role in promoting the environmental pollution and the feedback effect of fiscal decentralization on environmental pollution is also positive, though it is not significant. The relationship of GDP per capita and environmental pollution shows inverted U-shaped curve. Due to the scale effect of secondary industry, the higher the level of secondary industry development in a unit is, the easier it is to attract the secondary industry in adjacent units, which mitigates the environmental pollution in adjacent units. Densely populated areas tend to deteriorate local environment, but environmental regulation in densely populated areas is often tighter than other areas, which reduces environmental pollution to a certain extent.

show abstract

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Socioeconomic Drivers of Environmental Pollution in China: A Spatial Econometric Analysis

Liu

Chen

Wei

2017

Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…9 Hence, a decrease in productivity gap has a stronger tax e¤ect in the importing region. 10 In setting taxes, a region takes into account the e¤ects that these instruments have on total surplus, tax revenues, and environmental damages. Independently of whether the region has a comparative advantage in a given sector, it faces a trade-o¤ between generating more tax revenues through greater production which requires lower taxes and keeping the environment cleaner through lower production and thus higher taxes.…”

Section: Propositionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inter‐regional competition, comparative advantage and environmental federalism

Ferrara

Missios

Yildiz

2014

Canadian J of Economics

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In this paper, we compare endogenous environmental policy setting with centralized and decentralized governments when regions have comparative advantages in di¤erent polluting goods. We develop a tworegion, two-good model with inter-regional environmental damages and perfect competition in product markets, where both regions produce both goods. Despite positive spillovers of pollution across regions, the model predicts that decentralization may lead to weaker or stricter environmental standards or taxes, depending on the degree of regional comparative advantage and the extent of transboundary pollution. This suggests that federalism can lead to either a "race to the bottom" or a "race to the top," without relying on ine¢ cient lobbying e¤orts or capital competition.

show abstract

“…Although this covers an admittedly short time span, it is interesting that none of the three studies find any evidence of a race to the bottom. List and Gerking (2000), using state-level data, have estimated a fixed-effects model that looks at both levels of environmental quality and abatement expenditures. They find no evidence of any deterioration in environmental quality or decline in abatement efforts; on the contrary, they find some instances of improvements, leading them to conclude that "…in this instance, the race to the bottom did not appear to materialize."…”

Section: Environmental Federalismmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Political Economy of Environmental Policy

Oates

Portney

2003

Handbook of Environmental Economics

206

128

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This paper provides a review and assessment of the extensive literature on the political determination of environmental regulation. A promising theoretical literature has emerged relatively recently that provides models of the political interaction of government with various interest groups in the setting of environmental standards and the choice of regulatory instruments. A large empirical literature supports such models, finding evidence of the influence of interest groups but also evidence that net social benefits are often an important determinant of environmental policy choices. We then take up the issue of environmental federalism and the large and growing theoretical literature that addresses the competitive "race to the bottom." The paper concludes with a brief look at the evolution of environmental policy and finds that economics has come to play a growing role both in the setting of standards for environmental quality and in the design of regulatory measures.

show abstract

Regulatory Federalism and Environmental Protection in the United States

Cited by 122 publications

References 15 publications

Socioeconomic Drivers of Environmental Pollution in China: A Spatial Econometric Analysis

Socioeconomic Drivers of Environmental Pollution in China: A Spatial Econometric Analysis

Inter‐regional competition, comparative advantage and environmental federalism

The Political Economy of Environmental Policy

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About