我国省域人口结构对环境污染影响的异质性研究——基于有限混合模型

Study on the Heterogeneity of the Effect of Provincial Population Structure on Environmental Pollution in China:Based on the Finite Mixture Model

环境污染会受到人口结构变迁的影响,且具有明显的空间异质性特征。然而既有相关研究大多对样本进行了主观空间分类,容易造成实证结果的偏差。为此,本文引入带有伴随变量的有限混合模型,对2000—2020年我国省域面板数据进行客观分类,进而讨论人口结构对环境污染影响的异质性特征。研究结果显示:第一,人口结构对环境污染的影响可以利用包含2条路径的有限混合模型进行异质性特征的细致刻画;第二,引入技术创新和产业结构作为伴随变量,发现二者均能够有效缓解老龄化对环境污染的负面影响,并增强人力资本、城镇化的减污作用。第三,22个省份在样本期内发生了影响路径的转换,并且技术创新对路径转换的决定作用明显强于产业结构升级的作用。本文为人口结构变迁背景下我国的环境污染治理提供了有益借鉴。

Environmental pollution is affected by population structure change and has obvious spatial heterogeneity. However, most of the existing relevant studies make subjective spatial classification of samples, which will cause the deviation of empirical results. For this reason, this paper introduces a finite mixture model with concomitant variables for the first time to objectively classify the panel data of China’s provinces from 2000 to 2020, and then discusses the heterogeneous characteristics of the impact of population structure on environmental pollution. The results show that: first, the influence of population structure on environmental pollution can be described in detail by using a finite mixture model with 2groups. Second, by introducing technological innovation and industrial structure as the concomitant variables, it can be seen that both of them can effectively alleviate the negative impact of aging on environmental pollution, and enhance the role of human capital and urbanization in reducing pollution.Third, more importantly, group conversion occurred in 22 provinces during the investigation period, and the decisive role of technological innovation in group conversion is obviously stronger than that of industrial structure upgrading. This paper provides a useful reference for China’s environmental pollution control under the background of population structure change.