中国环境规制、地理区位与企业生产率增长

Environmental regulation, geographic location and growth of firms' productivity in China

环境规制对企业生产率的影响是当前学术界的研究热点,但基于地理区位视角的研究较少。应用中国环境规制地理空间数据和微观企业数据,实证分析了环境规制空间差异与环境规制空间相关性对企业生产率的影响。结果表明,环境规制空间差异与企业生产率之间存在显著的倒U型关系;环境规制空间相关性作用显著,邻近城市环境规制提升有利于本城市企业生产率增长;环境规制对生产效率高的企业具有显著促进作用,但对生产效率低的企业影响不明显;不同的地理区位,环境规制对企业生产率的影响不同,相对于中西部地区,东部地区环境规制促进企业生产率增长的作用更为显著。本文揭示了在地理区位视角下,针对环境规制对企业生产率的影响,"成本假说"和"波特假说"具有各自的解释空间。

The impact of environmental regulations on f＇trms＇ productivities is a hot topic at present, but little attention has been paid to the geographic location aspect. As the literature show two kinds of theories named ＂Cost hypothesis＂ and ＂Porter hypothesis＂ according to the impact of environmental regulations on firms＇ productivities, this paper empirically analyzes the influences of spatial difference and interdependence of environmental regulations on firms＇ productivity based geographic data and micro-firm-level data for the period of 2004-2007. Our results show that spatial difference of environmental regulations has a significant impact on finns＇ total factor productivity with an inverted U-shaped relationship. That is to say, appropriate intensity of environmental regulations could promote firms＇ productivities, but if the environmental regulations are too intensive, firms＇ productivity might decrease. The effect of spatial correlation of environmental regulation is significant. The environmental regulation of neighborhoods can promote the productivity of firms in native city. Environmental regulation has a significant impact on the firms with high efficiency, but no significant influence on firms with low efficiency. Besides, the impact of environmental regulation on productivity of pollution-intensive firms is variant according to geographic location. The promotion of environmental regulation on firms＇ productivity is stronger in the eastern region than in the central and western regions. Our research suggests different mechanisms for the Cost hypothesis and Porter hypothesis in the context of geographic location. The governments shall make different regulations in different parts of the country instead of one policy.