Automobile quality choice under pollution control regulation

In this paper, we develop a modified quality choice model to study the effects of various mobile-source air pollution control regulations. We have a single producer that supplies a fixed number of car types (two) but faces a spectrum of consumers differing in their valuation of car quality. The car manufacturer chooses the quality levels of the two car types as well as the sales mix between the two types and the size of the market it wishes to supply. By endogenizing both the sales mix and the market size, while still allowing quality to be a choice variable, we are able to more completely analyze the impact of any car pollution control regulation. Existing studies of this impact either focus on the model line adjustment response (shifts in the quality array) or on the price adjustment response (changes in the sales mix and market size). In allowing for both the model line and the price adjustment options, we find that the corporate average fuel efficiency (CAFE) standard is unambiguously welfare superior to the low-emission vehicle quantity constraint (LEV) and zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) programs. We also show that the effects of the CAFE standard are not equivalent to those of a fuel tax, as previously found, and that, for a given car pollution target, the former is preferred to the latter.      

Dynamic modelling of pollution abatement in a CGE framework

This paper deals with the specification of pollution abatement in dynamic computable general equilibrium (CGE) models and analyses the dynamic feedback mechanisms between economy and abatement in the context of environmental policy. A Ramsey-type economic model is presented, in which bottom-up technical and economic information on abatement techniques is integrated in a top-down dynamic CGE context. The practical suitability of the specification is illustrated by an empirical application for climate change and acidification in the Netherlands. The results show that a mixture of some slowdown of economic growth, a substantial restructuring of the economy and implementation of most technical abatement measures is optimal.     

Co-ordinated environmental regulation: controlling non-point nitrate pollution while maintaining river flows

Environmental policy often addresses multiple targets, yet much economic analysis of pollution control is based on a single-target objective. In this paper, we present an analysis of policies to control non-point source nitrate pollution in the presence of minimum river flow restrictions. A non-linear bio-physical economic optimisation model of an intensively cultivated Scottish agricultural catchment was constructed. The presence of minimum river flow controls in the catchment was found to reduce nitrogen pollution. However, by themselves, river flow controls were found not to be a cost effective means to reduce non-point pollution. We quantify the improved social welfare from coordinating the environmental regulation of river flows and pollution, and determine the conditions under which such coordination is beneficial. The paper also investigates whether the benefits of such coordination can be sustained under wetter (winter) weather conditions implied by current climate change predictions.     

Effects of environmental regulation on air pollution control in China: a spatial Durbin econometric analysis

Journal of Regulatory Economics - Based on provincial panel date of China for the period 2001–2014, this study empirically adopts the slacks-based measure of directional distance function...     

Dynamic economic analysis of marine pollution prevention technologies: An application to double hulls and electronic charts

Marine pollution associated with shipping accidents has resulted in a Congressional mandate for double hulls on tankers in U.S. waters. In this paper, we formulate a social planner's problem using optimal control theory to examine the relative cost-effectiveness of double hulls and alternative pollution prevention technologies, and the optimal installation strategy for such technologies. The model encompasses the costs and benefits associated with shipping operations, damage to the marine environment, and investment in each technology. A computer simulation of the model is used to evaluate investment strategies for two technological options: double hulls and electronic chart systems. Results indicate that electronic charts may be a far more cost-effective approach to marine pollution control.     

Institutionalized pollution havens

A multiple-principal, multiple-agent lobby group model suggests that the effect of foreign direct investment (FDI) on environmental policies is conditional on the structure of host countries' political institutions such as the number of legislative units (veto players). The model also yields the novel concept of “aggregate honesty” which combines veto players and corruption. FDI raises environmental policy stringency where the number of legislative units are many (aggregate honesty is high), but reduces it where the legislative units are few (aggregate honesty is low). Our panel data evidence is fully consistent with these predictions. An additional contribution is to show the empirical importance of endogenizing environmental policy in Pollution Haven Hypothesis studies. Only when treated as endogenous does environmental policy have a significant negative effect on FDI.     

On modeling incentive systems which utilize pollution charges for pollution abatement

This paper examines a scheme of economic incentives for environmental protection, in which spatially differentiated pollution taxes are in use in compensating the pollution abatement costs. A simple mathematical model is described which determines an incentive system that encourages polluters to reduce the discharges to an acceptable level of ambient quality standards in a cost-effective manner. It is shown that the vector of pollution charges has to be proportional to the marginal abatement cost vector, but is smaller than the latter in magnitude. It is demonstrated that a necessary incentive effect may be achieved even if the total pollution charge is much lower (about three times) than the total abatement costs. It is also estimated how this charge incentive system reconciles conflicting criteria of cost-effectiveness and of equity. These conclusions are verified by numerical experiments with real data.     

Dynamics of pollution control when damage is sensitive to the rate of pollution accumulation

Economic models which take into account the long-term effects of pollution in the environment specify pollution damage as a function of the accumulated stock. Several economists have proposed another formulation where damage is a function of the time derivative of the pollution stock. This paper considers the intertemporal efficiency implications of this formulation. The first specification is qualitative and the objective functional includes both the rate of change and the level of the pollution stock. The second specification is a stylized climate change model with a linear damage function where damage depends only on the rate of increase in global temperature. The analysis reveals that the efficiency properties of optimal pollution control are very sensitive to this change in the damage function. Intertemporal efficiency may require higher emissions compared with the level which is optimal from the myopic point of view. An increase in the rate of discount typically reduces the optimal emission level.     

我国经济的绿色化发展与企业绿色营销战略的实施

我国实施可持续发展战略要求经济的绿色化 ,打破“绿色壁垒”也需要经济的绿色化 ,经济绿色化是我国国民经济发展的必然选择。要实现经济的绿色化发展 ,其基本立足点在于企业的微观经营管理。为此 ,我国企业应该实施绿色营销战略。     

试论纺织品的绿色营销

纺织品的绿色营销正在成为纺织企业成功进入国际市场的关键 ,它贯穿在企业的整个的经营过程中 ,本文对绿色纺织品的生产、销售及绿色组织等方面进行了探讨 ,指出了我国企业的应对之策。     

Concentration of industrial pollution in China

We pioneer the application of the Theil index, a statistic primarily used to measure economic inequality or racial segregation, to studying the concentration of local pollutants. While most discussions are on reducing the level of pollution, our goal is to investigate the effect of China’s development strategies on the distribution of pollution. Decomposition of the index into the between-region and within-region concentrations provides a unique policy evaluation for China. We find that while the within-region and between-region imbalances of industrial output have both been reduced, the speed of diversion of pollution does not follow. There is not much between-region movement of pollution over time. Most changes are within-region.     

Disutility of pollution and endogenous growth

Endogenous growth is generally built on a positive externality hypothesis which is the opposite of a negative externality caused by pollution. We study a linear technology with simple assumption: an aggregate capital stock which represents a learning by doing effect and a pollution flow proportional to production. In this framework, we analyse the precise effects on growth of the disutility of pollution and its interaction with the utility of consumption in an economy without abatement technology. The decentralized equilibrium always leads to unlimited growth, but optimal growth is often limited (the negative effect of pollution dominating the positive effect of learning by doing). In this case, the optimal policy which leads the decentralized economy to follow the optimal growth path is to tax capital; in contrast with the optimal subsidy policy in an economy without pollution. When an abatement technology is introduced, the optimal solution can lead the economy to unlimited growth, whatever the form of the utility function.     

Reluctant regulation

We study the effect of state ownership on the market-to-book ratios of publicly traded European utilities from 1994 to 2005. We find that when the company is subject to independent regulation, state ownership seems positively associated with firm value. This relation tends to appear in countries where weak checks and balances and political fragmentation do not constrain the power of the executive. Our results suggest that, where political institutions are weak, politicians may influence regulatory agencies in order to benefit state-owned firms.     

International treaties on trade and global pollution

The paper shows that global pollution need not rise under free trade in goods and/or emissions even in the complete absence of income effects. Differences in environmental concerns across the countries lead to differences in the pollution intensity of production and, thus, generate the possibility of increasing world output and income without increasing the world pollution by shifting the production of the polluting good from the country with higher pollution intensity of production to the country with lower one. We show that free trade in goods and/or emissions can induce precisely such a shifting of production with the country with greater environmental concern exporting the polluting good. The paper also demonstrates the possibility of a first-best international treaty on global pollution in which each country or group of countries is better-off.     

Optimal pollution taxation in a Cournot duopoly

It is well known that the optimal pollution tax in a competitive industry is equal to the marginal damage inflicted by the pollution. It has also been shown that the optimal pollution tax on a monopoly is less than the marginal damage. In this paper, I derive the optimal pollution tax for a Cournot duopoly. If firms have different production costs, the optimal tax rate may exceed the marginal damage. This is so because the tax may be an effective instrument for allocating production from the less to the more efficient firm. It is also shown that, if one firm has a positive most preferred pollution tax, the sum of consumer and producer surpluses will be declining in the tax at this level.     

Dynamic enfranchisement

Why would an enfranchised elite voluntarily dilute its power by expanding the franchise? The central intuition behind our analysis is that the dilution of power by an enfranchised elite is equivalent to the delegation of power by one member of the elite—a pivotal voter—to another citizen, who in turn becomes the pivotal voter in the new (expanded) elite. Such delegation might be useful if it allows the current pivotal voter to credibly commit to future policy choices. The current pivotal voter realizes that the agent to whom authority is delegated will face similar incentives to subsequently transfer power, and this effect tempers the extent to which the franchise is extended. We develop a recursive, infinite horizon model that generates the possibility of gradual franchise expansion. We show that, in equilibrium, expansion occurs if and only if the private decisions of the citizenry have a net positive spillover to the dynamic payoff of the current pivotal voter. The class of games we study can accommodate a number of proposed explanations for franchise extension, including the threat of insurrection, and ideological or class conflict within the elite.     

如何根治"白色污染"

“白色污染”是伴随人口数量的不断增长、石油化工工业的迅速发展、人民生活质量的日益提高而产生的一处现代污染现象。它已经严重地影响了城乡环境。如何有效地治理“白色污染”，促进城乡人口、资源环境与社会经济的可持续发展，是亟待解决的重大问题。本文在分析“白色污染物”排放和污染状况、现行垃圾处理方法缺陷的基础上，提出了垃圾分类回收和处理发展循环经济，是根治“白色污染”、保护环境的必由之路这一基本观点，对政策法规、管理体制、科技投入等方面提出几点建议。     

Constitutional choice for the control of water pollution

Before passage of the Clean Water Act, water pollution was controlled by the common law of nuisance and the law of water rights. Had the common law not been superseded, it might have provided more ecologically sound pollution control than has occurred under the command-and-control statutory regime. The Clean Water Act imposes mechanical definitions and is subject to political interference. In contrast, the principle of the common law lies in its evolutionary and competitive nature, which is consistent with the market process. Meiners thanks the Political Economy Research Center of Bozeman, Montana for support during his visit in 1992. We thank Terry Anderson, Robert Natelson, Jane Shaw and Richard Stroup for helpful comments. We owe a large intellectual debt to Bob Staaf, who made us think about the relationship between competitive markets and the common law.