Effects of Environmental Regulations on Manufacturing Plant Births: Evidence from a Propensity Score Matching Estimator
利用纽约州1980-1990年的县级数据，采用倾向得分匹配的半非参数方法，发现污染密集型工厂对环境规制有显著反应，且传统参数方法可能低估了严格规制的影响。
This study examines the effects of air quality regulation on economic activity. Anecdotal evidence and some recent empirical studies suggest that an inverse relationship exists between the stringency of environmental regulations and new plant formations. Using a unique county-level data set for New York State from 1980 to 1990, we revisit this conjecture using a seminonparametric method based on propensity score matching. Our empirical estimates suggest that pollution-intensive plants are responding to environmental regulations; more importantly, we find that traditional parametric methods used in previous studies may dramatically understate the impact of more stringent regulations. © 2003 President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.