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Do Industries Pollute More in Poorer Neighborhoods? Evidence From Toxic Releasing Plants in Mexico

Author

Listed:
  • Lopamudra Chakraborti
  • José Jaime Sainz Santamaría

    (Division of Economics, CIDE)

Abstract

Studies on industrial pollution and community pressure in developing countries are rare. We employ previously unused, self-reported toxics pollution data from Mexico to show that there exists some evidence of environmental justice concerns and community pressure in explaining industrial pollution behavior. We obtain historical data on toxic releases into water and land for the time period 2004 to 2012. We focus on 7 major pollutants including heavy metals and cyanide. To address endogeneity concerns of socioeconomic demographic variables, we use data from 2000 Census of Population and Housing and 2005 count data. Our results show that the immediate local population might be affected more by on-site land pollution than end-of-pipe discharges into waterbodies as the latter affects only downstream communities. Among our consistent results, increase in percent of households with telephone leads to lower land (and water) pollution; while increase percent of households with computer leads to increase in water pollution only. Similarly, vulnerable population as captured by percent of population over 65 years and higher unemployment rate leads to higher water pollution only. Other proxies for income and poverty have expected signs but not consistently across all models.

Suggested Citation

  • Lopamudra Chakraborti & José Jaime Sainz Santamaría, 2015. "Do Industries Pollute More in Poorer Neighborhoods? Evidence From Toxic Releasing Plants in Mexico," Working Papers DTE 587, CIDE, División de Economía.
  • Handle: RePEc:emc:wpaper:dte587
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Furszyfer Del Rio, Dylan D. & Sovacool, Benjamin K., 2023. "Of cooks, crooks and slum-dwellers: Exploring the lived experience of energy and mobility poverty in Mexico's informal settlements," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    2. Chakraborti, Lopamudra & Shimshack, Jay P., 2022. "Environmental disparities in urban Mexico: Evidence from toxic water pollution," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Industrial Pollution; Local Income and Unemployment Effects; Informal Regulation; Environmental Justice; Community Pressure; Toxic Releases;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q52 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Pollution Control Adoption and Costs; Distributional Effects; Employment Effects

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