School of Economics, Zhejiang Gongshang University, 18 Xuezheng Road, Hangzhou, 310018, China.
J Environ Manage. 2019 Oct 15;248:109248. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2019.07.019. Epub 2019 Jul 13.
Using firm establishment-level data combined with provincial socio-economic characteristic panel data in China for the period of 2011-2015, this study seeks to empirically examine the impact of environmental regulation on location choices of polluting firms. The results of the conditional logit model provide compelling evidence that environmental regulations do affect the location choice of firms in polluting industries. Instead of supporting the pollution haven effect, our results consistently confirm the Porter effect at the country level. This result is robust when taking endogeneity problem into account, adopting various model specifications and estimation strategies, using alternative measurements of environmental regulation and location choices, and subsampling excluding international political events. However, the results also show divergent effect of environmental regulation on location choices for heterogeneous firms. Specifically, polluting firms in eastern region prefer to invest in provinces with stringent environmental policies but those in other regions, especially in northeastern region, choose to locate in provinces with lax environmental regulation. While water-dependent polluting firms with a low level of footlooseness are more likely to enter locations with loose environmental regulation, air pollution-intensive firms tend to locate in provinces with tight environmental legislation. These results have policy implications for transitional China as well as other developing countries with similar experience.
利用中国 2011-2015 年期间的企业层面数据和省级社会经济特征面板数据，本研究旨在实证检验环境规制对污染企业区位选择的影响。条件逻辑回归模型的结果提供了令人信服的证据，表明环境规制确实会影响污染行业企业的区位选择。我们的结果并没有支持污染避难所效应，而是一致地在国家层面上证实了波特效应。当考虑到内生性问题、采用各种模型规格和估计策略、使用环境规制和区位选择的替代衡量标准以及排除国际政治事件的抽样时，这一结果是稳健的。然而，结果还表明，环境规制对异质企业的区位选择有不同的影响。具体来说，东部地区的污染企业更倾向于投资于环境政策严格的省份，而其他地区的污染企业，特别是东北地区的污染企业，则选择投资于环境监管宽松的省份。而水资源依赖型、低流动性的污染企业更有可能进入环境监管宽松的地区，而空气污染密集型企业则倾向于在环境立法严格的省份选址。这些结果对转型期的中国以及其他具有类似经验的发展中国家具有政策意义。
