Can R&D-inducing green tariffs replace international environmental regulations?

This paper investigates the link between trade and environment by exploring the effects of green tariffs on innovation, location of production and the environment. It shows that tariffs levied on polluting goods could result in less world pollution than global harmonization of environmental standards by inducing more pollution-abatement R&D effort and generating lower unit emissions from production. Specifically, green tariffs reduce pollution by (1) shifting production to the region where environmental standards are respected, (2) inducing the firm in the clean country to engage in more abatement R&D by granting it a higher market power/share in its home market, (3) instigating green R&D investment by deterring delocation. When these outweigh the R&D-creating effect of environmental harmonization in the dirty country, green tariffs bring about a cleaner environment.     

我国制造业环境管制的实证研究

从制造业的角度出发,分析了政府对环境管制(ER)的两种形式:正式管制(FER)和非正式管制(I-ER),建立了环境管制均衡方程,并且采用面板数据的分析方法对理论假设进行了验证。研究表明,假设的影响制造业环境管制的主要因素:政府保护意愿、劳动密集程度、产业规模、经济外向度、产业国有化程度、科技吸收转化支出和劳动力素质的高低均产生了显著的影响。     

Unemployment insurance: The role of electoral systems and regional labour markets

Levels of insurance against unemployment vary considerably across countries. Replacement rates, the ratio relating income from unemployment to what people earned when they were employed, are higher in countries with proportional electoral systems than in countries with majoritarian systems. Also, replacement rates are positively correlated with per capita income and negatively correlated with the countries' unemployment rates. I develop an electoral competition model that replicates these stylized facts.     

Taxation of Mobile Factors as Insurance under Uncertainty

This paper considers the effects of the taxation of mobile factors, i.e., capital, under uncertainty. The wages earned by residents of a jurisdiction are uncertain due to random shocks. Since the uncertain wages in a jurisdiction depend on the amount of mobile capital employed in the jurisdiction, and since taxation alters the quantity of capital employed, taxation affects the riskiness of uncertain wages. In particular, the taxation of capital moderates the fluctuation of uncertain wages, thereby providing insurance. For this reason, jurisdictions use distortionary capital taxation even if lump‐sum taxation is available. In addition, this insurance effect counteracts the tendency toward too low tax rates on capital arising from tax competition, and possibly improves the efficiency of tax competition.     

发展中国农业保险的对策分析

目前中国农业保险发展滞后,其原因主要有农民收入不高、农业保险保费收入低、农业保险的法律法规不够完善及农业保险组织体系不够健全,应提高农民收入、完善农业保险法律法规、建立健全农业保险组织体系,以促进中国农业保险业的发展。     

进城农民工社会保障的影响因素研究

缺乏明确的法律规定、不同制度模式之间难以互通互联及其自身的缺陷,是制约进城农民工参加社会保障的重要制度性因素;性别、城市工作年限、是否签订劳动合同、工资收入、所在城市等则是影响进城农民工参加社会保障的非制度性因素。从制度创新和强化执法等方面提出了政策建议。     

Consistency and optimality in a dynamic game of pollution control II: Monopoly

This paper continues a line of research begun in Batabyal (1995a). I model the interaction between a regulator and a monopolistic, polluting firm as a Stackelberg differential game in which the regulator leads. The firm creates pollution, which results in a stock externality. I analyze the intertemporal effects of alternate pollution control measures. The principal issue here concerns the dynamic inconsistency of the optimal solution. Inter alia, I compare the steady state levels of pollution under optimal and under dynamically consistent policies.     

Health Damage of Air Pollution: An Estimate of a Dose–Response Relationship for the Netherlands

This paper estimates the dose-response relationship between air pollution and the number of work loss days for the Netherlands. The study is based on illness data (work loss days) for the Dutch labour population and average year concentrations of air pollution in 29 districts. The dose-response relationship has been estimated by means of two different techniques: the ordinary least squares method (OLS) and the one-way fixed-effects method (OWFEM), which we consider to be more adequate. In general health effects are much smaller when OWFEM is applied than if OLS is used. With OWFEM a significant relationship is found between sulphate aerosol (SO₄), ammonia (NH₃) and the number of work loss days (WLDs). Particulates (TSP), O₃ and SO₂ have no significant effect on the number of WLDs. These results differ from those obtained in studies in the United States, which indicate that particulates (TSP) and other small particles, ozone (O₃) and to a lesser extent SO₄ and SO₂ significantly influence the number of WLDs.     

Does the Company Lawyer Have Your Back? A Brief Look at the Need for Personal Private Liability Insurance

There are four traditional uses of private personal liability insurance dating from the 1970s to the present (Hayes 1979; Sommers 2005) which pertain either to individuals or corporations. There is insurance to cover damage to rental cars, umbrella insurance to cover any injury to a guest at one’s home, insurance bought by corporations to cover potential corporate responsibility for actions of company representatives and insurance including misadventures with financial information and morally hazardous behavior as well as corporate required actions which are later deemed to be wrong or inappropriate. Employees need to find out if the employee manual provides for coverage for legal liabilities resulting out of performing job responsibilities. Due to a need to reduce company costs, many companies are reducing or eliminating coverage for employees for many types of actions. Private personal liability insurance gives you the peace of mind to know what you are covered for and for how long. Employee rights versus corporate budgets are at the core of this discussion.     

The Case of the Missing Pollution Haven Hypothesis

One particularly vexing puzzle for economists and policymakers over the past several decades concerns the empirical significance of the theoretically predicted pollution haven hypothesis. While neoclassical theory and conventional wisdom both surmise that local economies will suffer deleterious effects from stricter environmental regulations, empirical studies have largely failed to validate such claims. This study utilizes the method of matching to show that the impact of stricter regulation is heterogeneous spatially, varying systematically based on location-specific attributes. Previous studies that assume a homogenous response may therefore inadvertently mask the overall impact of more stringent regulations by pooling unaffected and affected regions.JEL Classification: Q25, Q28, H00, L51, R1The authors wish to thank to Michael Crew, Anthony Heyes, an anonymous referee, Werner Antweiler, Randy Becker, Wayne Gray, Shelby Gerking, Michael Greenstone, Vern Henderson, and Arik Levinson. Participants at various university seminars and conferences also lent useful insights to this line of research.