Re-evaluating the success of the EPA's 33/50 program: evidence from facility participation

Using previously unavailable data, we examine facility participation in the 33/50 Program and its effect on aggregate and toxicity weighted emissions between1991 and 1995 for a sample of facilities whose parent firms committed to the Program. By focusing on individual facilities we avoid the biases created by aggregating emissions across facilities. We find that while more polluting facilities within a firm were more likely to participate, even when we account for the toxicity of emissions, across firms there is no evidence of greater participation by facilities with higher emissions. Although emissions of the 33/50 chemicals fell over the years, we find that participation in the Program did not lead to the decline in the 33/50 releases generated by these facilities.Toxic Release Inventory; program participation; program evaluation, GMM, dynamic panel

CEECS integration into regional production networks. Trade effects of EU-accesion

We estimate a gravity model that incorporates the extensive margin of trade and accounts for firm heterogeneity to evaluate the effect of the EU-accession on CEECs trade in intermediates and final goods for the period 1999-2009. The importance of production networks is captured by including imports of intermediates as a determinant of a country’s exports of final goods. We find a positive and significant effect of the EU-accession on CEECs trade in intermediate and final goods. Hence, the elimination of “behind the border” trade barriers has a positive impact on increasing not only trade volumes but also trade varieties.gravity equation; panel data; production networks; economic integration; trade flows.

Central East European Countries’ accession into the European Union: role of extensive margin for trade in intermediate and final goods

We study the effect on trade in intermediates and final goods of the Central East European Countries’ (CEECs) accession into the European Union (EU) for the period 1999–2009. In doing so, we estimate a gravity model that incorporates the extensive margin of trade and accounts for firm heterogeneity. We capture the importance of production networks by including imports of intermediates as a determinant of a country’s exports of final goods. We find a positive and significant effect of the CEECs accession on EU trade in intermediate and final goods. Once the extensive margin of trade is accounted for, the effect of the CEECs accession into the EU is higher on trade in intermediate goods than on trade in final goods.The author acknowledges the support and collaboration of Project ECO2010-15863. We also would like to thank the participants of the research seminar held at the Universität Osnabrück, Institut für Empirische Wirtschaftsforschung, and the Seventh Annual Conference of the German Development Economics conference held in Berlin for their helpful comments and suggestions, which have been incorporated to the paper

Are the Central East European Countries Pollution Havens?

The aim of this article is to investigate the relationship between environmental stringency and intra–European Union (EU) trade flows. Two main hypotheses are tested. First, we test whether the stringency of a country's environmental regulations may result in pollution havens. Second, we test whether the results differ by industry and by the EU membership tenure (EU-15 vs. the newly added Central East European Countries). An augmented gravity model is estimated using panel data for 21 countries during the period from 1999 to 2013 for the full sample and also separately for the Central East European Countries and the EU-15 members. Our results show weak support for the pollution haven hypothesis for some dirty industries, mainly for net exports from western EU countries to the rest. Instead, support for the “Porter hypothesis” is found for trade in clean goods.The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: I. M.-Z. acknowledges the support and collaboration of Project ECO2014-58991-C3-2-R

Re-evaluating the success of the EPA's 33/50 program: evidence from facility participation

Using previously unavailable data, we examine facility participation in the 33/50 Program and its effect on aggregate and toxicity weighted emissions between1991 and 1995 for a sample of facilities whose parent firms committed to the Program. By focusing on individual facilities we avoid the biases created by aggregating emissions across facilities. We find that while more polluting facilities within a firm were more likely to participate, even when we account for the toxicity of emissions, across firms there is no evidence of greater participation by facilities with higher emissions. Although emissions of the 33/50 chemicals fell over the years, we find that participation in the Program did not lead to the decline in the 33/50 releases generated by these facilities

Third Party Certification and Self-Regulation: Evidence from Responsible Care and Accidents in the US Chemical Industry

In 2005, the Responsible Care (RC) program implemented a major structural change that mandated independent third party certification for all participants. The goal of this paper is to explore whether the introduction of mandatory third party certification has reduced accidents in RC facilities compared to non-RC facilities in the U.S. chemical industry. Using a sample of 21,741 observations from 1,460 facilities owned by 956 firms between 1995 and 2010, we estimate the average treatment effect by comparing RC facilities to statistically equivalent non-RC facilities before and after the introduction of third party certification. We find that, on average, the effect of third party certification on reducing the accidents is statistically insignificant. The results do not change when we account for self-selection into RC and endogenous treatment

The Slope of the U.S. Nominal Treasury Yield Curve Unemployment and Stability of Wage Determination: United States versus New York State

ABSTRACT We find the Phillips-type model performs well in explaining wage adjustment for US non-farm business, US manufacturing, and NY manufacturing sector, showing a typical adjustment to price inflation expectation and labor market tightness. While the basic wage model shows evidence of a structural shift for the post-1991 period, this is not evident in the adjusted models for both US non-farm business and NY manufacturing, implying that the observed structural shift for the post-1991 period is likely to be the result of model mis-, or under-specification. The effect of the fraction of unemployment due to permanent job loss on wage inflation appears to be manufacturing-specific, while a smaller adjustment to price inflation expectation appears to be state-specific. On the other hand, the significant effect of the percent of adults unemployed appears to be a national phenomenon