IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/finlet/v63y2024ics1544612324003763.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Repression or promotion? Transfer payments, ecological constraints, and enterprise development

Author

Listed:
  • Sun, Hong
  • Cheng, Nanyang
  • Zhang, Renjian
  • Shen, Wenxing
  • Miao, Chunxia

Abstract

The establishment of national key ecological function areas constitutes a pivotal policy tool for China's environmental preservation and restoration initiatives. Nevertheless, the economic ramifications of policy implementation on the growth of regional enterprises remain substantial. This research employs the quasi-natural experiment framework provided by the national key ecological function area, focusing on 102 counties in Hebei Province from 2014 to 2018. By employing the difference-in-difference method, this study scrutinizes the policy's impact on enterprises surpassing designated size thresholds, ensuring the robustness of results through multiple tests. The findings reveal a pronounced negative effect on regional enterprise development subsequent to policy implementation, as evidenced by a 12.57 percent decline in the developmental metrics of enterprises exceeding the specified size threshold. Furthermore, this adverse impact exacerbates with prolonged policy duration, thereby accentuating the imposition of “ecological constraints” that restrict enterprise expansion in the pursuit of comprehensive ecological protection. Heterogeneity analysis underscores disparate policy impacts, particularly affecting counties characterized by low levels of industrialization and substantial local fiscal expenditure. This study posits that the prevalent utilization of environmental surveillance and punitive measures may contribute to these adverse effects, fostering a passive rather than innovative enterprise comportment.

Suggested Citation

  • Sun, Hong & Cheng, Nanyang & Zhang, Renjian & Shen, Wenxing & Miao, Chunxia, 2024. "Repression or promotion? Transfer payments, ecological constraints, and enterprise development," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:finlet:v:63:y:2024:i:c:s1544612324003763
    DOI: 10.1016/j.frl.2024.105346
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1544612324003763
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.frl.2024.105346?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Eliana La Ferrara & Alberto Chong & Suzanne Duryea, 2012. "Soap Operas and Fertility: Evidence from Brazil," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(4), pages 1-31, October.
    2. Kemkes, Robin J. & Farley, Joshua & Koliba, Christopher J., 2010. "Determining when payments are an effective policy approach to ecosystem service provision," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(11), pages 2069-2074, September.
    3. Gene M. Grossman & Alan B. Krueger, 1995. "Economic Growth and the Environment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 110(2), pages 353-377.
    4. Alberto Abadie & David Drukker & Jane Leber Herr & Guido W. Imbens, 2004. "Implementing matching estimators for average treatment effects in Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 4(3), pages 290-311, September.
    5. He, Jie & Wang, Hua, 2012. "Economic structure, development policy and environmental quality: An empirical analysis of environmental Kuznets curves with Chinese municipal data," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 49-59.
    6. Changan Gong & Jianhua Zhang & Hao Liu, 2021. "Do industrial pollution activities in China respond to ecological fiscal transfers? Evidence from payments to national key ecological function zones," Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 64(7), pages 1184-1203, June.
    7. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    8. Deng Yue & Apurbo Sarkar & Yu Cui & Lu Qian & Zhao Minjuan & Jiban Chandro Das, 2021. "Ecological compensation of grain trade within urban, rural areas and provinces in China: a prospect of a carbon transfer mechanism," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(11), pages 16688-16712, November.
    9. Hongjie Cao & Meina Li & Fengqin Qin & Yankun Xu & Li Zhang & Zhifeng Zhang, 2022. "Economic Development, Fiscal Ecological Compensation, and Ecological Environment Quality," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(8), pages 1-19, April.
    10. Liu, Qing & Lu, Yi, 2015. "Firm investment and exporting: Evidence from China's value-added tax reform," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(2), pages 392-403.
    11. Michael E. Porter & Claas van der Linde, 1995. "Toward a New Conception of the Environment-Competitiveness Relationship," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 9(4), pages 97-118, Fall.
    12. Wunder, Sven & Engel, Stefanie & Pagiola, Stefano, 2008. "Taking stock: A comparative analysis of payments for environmental services programs in developed and developing countries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(4), pages 834-852, May.
    13. Brunnermeier, Smita B. & Cohen, Mark A., 2003. "Determinants of environmental innovation in US manufacturing industries," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 278-293, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hong Sun & Feng Dai & Wenxing Shen, 2023. "How China’s Ecological Compensation Policy Improves Farmers’ Income?—A Test of Environmental Effects," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(8), pages 1-21, April.
    2. Ma, Hongqi & Zou, Jingxian, 2022. "Impacts of official high-standard scenic spots on environment and growth — Evidence from China's 5A scenic spots at the city level," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 201(C).
    3. Yu, Yantuan & Chen, Xudong & Zhang, Ning, 2022. "Innovation and energy productivity: An empirical study of the innovative city pilot policy in China✰," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).
    4. Chen, Zhongfei & Zhang, Xiao & Chen, Fanglin, 2021. "Do carbon emission trading schemes stimulate green innovation in enterprises? Evidence from China," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 168(C).
    5. Gao, Yihong & Gao, Jiayan, 2023. "Low-carbon transformation and corporate cash holdings," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    6. Tan, Yan & Uprasen, Utai, 2022. "The effect of foreign direct investment on renewable energy consumption subject to the moderating effect of environmental regulation: Evidence from the BRICS countries," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 201(P2), pages 135-149.
    7. Wu, Jiamei & Chen, Zhibin & Guo, Chong, 2022. "How does anti-corruption affect green innovation? Evidence from China," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 405-424.
    8. Wu, Haitao & Hao, Yu & Ren, Siyu, 2020. "How do environmental regulation and environmental decentralization affect green total factor energy efficiency: Evidence from China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    9. Hille, Erik & Althammer, Wilhelm & Diederich, Henning, 2020. "Environmental regulation and innovation in renewable energy technologies: Does the policy instrument matter?," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).
    10. Giedrė Lapinskienė & Kęstutis Peleckis & Neringa Slavinskaitė, 2017. "Energy consumption, economic growth and greenhouse gas emissions in the European Union countries," Journal of Business Economics and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(6), pages 1082-1097, November.
    11. Francesco Nicolli & Francesco Vona & Lionel Nesta, 2012. "Determinants of Renewable Energy Innovation: Environmental Policies vs. Market Regulation," Working Papers 201204, University of Ferrara, Department of Economics.
    12. Smith, Helen F. & Sullivan, Caroline A., 2014. "Ecosystem services within agricultural landscapes—Farmers' perceptions," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 72-80.
    13. Ren, Shenggang & Hu, Yucai & Zheng, Jingjing & Wang, Yangjie, 2020. "Emissions trading and firm innovation: Evidence from a natural experiment in China," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 155(C).
    14. Grafström, Jonas & Poudineh, Rahmat, 2023. "No evidence of counteracting policy effects on European solar power invention and diffusion," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    15. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/eu4vqp9ompqllr09j0h0ji242 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Soumyananda Dinda, 2018. "Production technology and carbon emission: long-run relation with short-run dynamics," Journal of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(1), pages 106-121, January.
    17. Long Chen & Nan Wang & Qiyun Li & Wenjun Zhou, 2023. "Environmental regulation, foreign direct investment and China’s economic development under the new normal: restrain or promote?," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 25(5), pages 4195-4216, May.
    18. Cai Chen & Yingli Zhang & Yun Bai & Wenrui Li, 2021. "The impact of green credit on economic growth—The mediating effect of environment on labor supply," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(9), pages 1-21, September.
    19. Tan, Yafei & Zhu, Zhaohui, 2022. "The effect of ESG rating events on corporate green innovation in China: The mediating role of financial constraints and managers' environmental awareness," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    20. Carrilho, Cauê D. & Demarchi, Gabriela & Duchelle, Amy E. & Wunder, Sven & Morsello, Carla, 2022. "Permanence of avoided deforestation in a Transamazon REDD+ project (Pará, Brazil)," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 201(C).
    21. Giulio Cainelli & Massimiliano Mazzanti & Sandro Montresor, 2012. "Environmental Innovations, Local Networks and Internationalization," Industry and Innovation, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(8), pages 697-734, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:finlet:v:63:y:2024:i:c:s1544612324003763. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/frl .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.