Measuring Environmental Regulatory Stringency

Working Papers from Georgetown University, Department of Economics

Abstract: Researchers have long been interested in whether environmental regulations discourage investment, reduce labour demand, or alter patterns of international trade. But estimating those consequences of regulations requires devising a means of measuring their stringency empirically. While creating such a measure is often portrayed as a data collection problem, we identify four fundamental conceptual obstacles, which we label multidimensionality, simultaneity, industrial composition, and capital vintage. We then describe the long history of attempts to measure environmental regulatory stringency, and assess their relative success in light of those obstacles. Finally, we propose a new measure of stringency that would be based on emissions data and could be constructed separately for different pollutants.

Pages: 33
Date: 2013-03-15
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ene, nep-env and nep-res
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (55)

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Working Paper: Measuring Environmental Regulatory Stringency (2013)
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Roger Lagunoff Professor of Economics Georgetown University Department of Economics Washington, DC 20057-1036
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