Environmental tax and global income inequality: A method of moments quantile regression analysis

AbstractEven though Environmental tax policy impacts inequality theoretically, empirical studies remain scanty not only in the context of volumes and the estimation approaches but are also focused on selected advanced countries, communities, households, and emerging countries, the neglect of the global or big picture effect, which is essential for measuring the overall effect of the collective and individual country-concerted efforts in addressing this global cancer. We provide empirical evidence in the global context using the novel method of moments quantile regression. We found that Income Inequality across the globe is sharply reduced by restrictive environmental tax policy, a finding that has ramifications for global sustainable development, particularly in dealing with the ravaging effects of Covid-19

The Choice of Healthy Source of Energy for Cooking Among Households in Ghana: Does Financial Inclusion Matter?

Air pollution resulting from the use of unhealthy/unclean energy sources for cooking causes illnesses such as lung cancer, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and ischaemic heart disease. In Ghana, each year, about 18 000 deaths are recorded due to the use of unhealthy energy sources for cooking. While financial inclusion can influence the adoption of healthy energy sources for cooking, less attention has been paid to it. This study, therefore, investigates the effect of financial inclusion on the choice of healthy source of energy for cooking among households in Ghana. Doing so reveals whether financial inclusion can be employed as a tool to decrease the use of unhealthy sources of energy for cooking in Ghana. We employ the Ghana Living Standards Survey round 7 (GLSS7) as the data source for the study whiles the binary logistic regression is used as the estimation technique. The findings show that, households with financial inclusion (using a single indicator) are more likely to choose healthy sources of energy for cooking relative to those without financial inclusion (OR = 2.52, P  < .01). Moreover, the effect of financial inclusion (using a single indicator) on choosing a healthy source of energy for cooking is greater among rural households (OR = 3.18, P  < .01) relative to their urban counterparts (OR = 2.27, P  < .01). The findings are robust even after using a different estimation technique and a combined index of financial inclusion. Thus, in the quest to improve the use of healthy sources of energy for cooking, enhancing financial inclusion among households, could be a useful strategy