Chinese Academy of Fiscal Sciences, Beijing 100142, China.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2022 Jul 1;19(13):8106. doi: 10.3390/ijerph19138106.
Based on China's provincial panel data from 2007 to 2019, the authors of this paper conducted an empirical test on the direct effect of China's fiscal expenditure structure on the reduction in environmental pollution with the use of a fixed effect model. We also creatively added an interaction item comprising vertical fiscal imbalance and the expenditure structure to further study the impact of vertical fiscal imbalance on reducing environmental pollution and its effect on the fiscal expenditure structure. The study results show that a structure in favor of expenditure on people's welfare noticeably reduces environmental pollution. However, after the introduction of the vertical fiscal imbalance indicator, the pollution reduction effect decreases. That is, the vertical fiscal imbalance weakens and distorts the impact of the fiscal expenditure structure on the reduction in environmental pollution. Therefore, it is possible to further motivate local governments with incentive measures, such as fiscal decentralization and the centralization of administrative responsibilities, and regulate the environmental pollution of local governments through use of restrictive measures, such as the "green GDP" evaluation mechanism to further improve the fiscal expenditure structure of local governments, enhance the environmental pollution reduction capability of fiscal expenditure.
基于中国 2007 年至 2019 年的省级面板数据，本文作者利用固定效应模型对中国财政支出结构对减少环境污染的直接影响进行了实证检验。我们还创造性地加入了垂直财政失衡和支出结构的交互项，以进一步研究垂直财政失衡对减少环境污染的影响及其对财政支出结构的影响。研究结果表明，有利于民生支出的结构显著降低了环境污染。然而，在引入垂直财政失衡指标后，污染减排效果下降。也就是说，垂直财政失衡削弱和扭曲了财政支出结构对减少环境污染的影响。因此，可以通过财政分权和行政职责集中等激励措施进一步激励地方政府，并通过“绿色 GDP”评价机制等限制措施来规范地方政府的环境污染，进一步完善地方政府的财政支出结构，提高财政支出的环境污染减排能力。
