IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/lsprsc/v12y2019i2d10.1007_s12076-019-00231-3.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The luxury of environmental concern in the US: evidence from Google Trends data

Author

Listed:
  • Chris Jeffords

    (Indiana University of Pennsylvania)

  • Alexi Thompson

    (Indiana University of Pennsylvania)

  • Jordan Gwinn

    (Indiana University of Pennsylvania
    University of Colorado Denver)

Abstract

Google Trends data are correlated with income per capita at the state-level to examine the relationship between search intensity related to environmental issues and economic growth. Depending on the search term or topic and if said term or topic is measured in nominal or real terms, a simple cross-section regression yields an inverted-U shaped relationship between the two. Over a relatively lower range of income, search intensity is positively correlated to economic growth but, after a certain threshold income level is reached, further economic growth is negatively correlated with search intensity. The results hold when controlling for education rates, unemployment rates, and presidential voting patterns within a state. Our results imply that individuals within relatively poorer states tend to seek out information about the natural environment with greater frequency than individuals within relatively richer states, and perhaps for a few different reasons. We discuss the implications of these results within the context of the limitations of the data.

Suggested Citation

  • Chris Jeffords & Alexi Thompson & Jordan Gwinn, 2019. "The luxury of environmental concern in the US: evidence from Google Trends data," Letters in Spatial and Resource Sciences, Springer, vol. 12(2), pages 121-132, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:lsprsc:v:12:y:2019:i:2:d:10.1007_s12076-019-00231-3
    DOI: 10.1007/s12076-019-00231-3
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s12076-019-00231-3
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s12076-019-00231-3?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Grossman, G.M & Krueger, A.B., 1991. "Environmental Impacts of a North American Free Trade Agreement," Papers 158, Princeton, Woodrow Wilson School - Public and International Affairs.
    2. De Bruyn, Sander M., 1997. "Explaining the environmental Kuznets curve: structural change and international agreements in reducing sulphur emissions," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 2(4), pages 485-503, November.
    3. Gene M. Grossman & Alan B. Krueger, 1995. "Economic Growth and the Environment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 110(2), pages 353-377.
    4. Chris Jeffords & Lanse Minkler, 2016. "Do Constitutions Matter? The Effects of Constitutional Environmental Rights Provisions on Environmental Outcomes," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(2), pages 294-335, May.
    5. Bhattarai, Madhusudan & Hammig, Michael, 2001. "Institutions and the Environmental Kuznets Curve for Deforestation: A Crosscountry Analysis for Latin America, Africa and Asia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 29(6), pages 995-1010, June.
    6. Meng-jieu Chen, 2017. "Environmental governance: disentangling the relationship between economic growth and rule of law on environmental policy stringency," Letters in Spatial and Resource Sciences, Springer, vol. 10(2), pages 253-275, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Dinda, Soumyananda, 2004. "Environmental Kuznets Curve Hypothesis: A Survey," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 431-455, August.
    2. Carolina Jimenez & Luis Moncada & Diego Ochoa-Jimenez & Wilman-Santiago Ochoa-Moreno, 2019. "Kuznets Environmental Curve for Ecuador: An Analysis of the Impact of Economic Growth on the Environment," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(21), pages 1-11, October.
    3. Saboori, Behnaz & Sulaiman, Jamalludin & Mohd, Saidatulakmal, 2012. "Economic growth and CO2 emissions in Malaysia: A cointegration analysis of the Environmental Kuznets Curve," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 184-191.
    4. Jie He, 2007. "Is the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis valid for developing countries? A survey," Cahiers de recherche 07-03, Departement d'économique de l'École de gestion à l'Université de Sherbrooke.
    5. Ajanaku, B.A. & Collins, A.R., 2021. "Economic growth and deforestation in African countries: Is the environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis applicable?," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    6. Md Danesh Miah & Md Farhad Hossain Masum & Masao Koike & Shalina Akther & Nur Muhammed, 2011. "Environmental Kuznets Curve: the case of Bangladesh for waste emission and suspended particulate matter," Environment Systems and Decisions, Springer, vol. 31(1), pages 59-66, March.
    7. Matias Piaggio & Emilio Padilla & Carolina Roman, 2015. "The long-run relationshiop between C02 emissions and economic activity in a small open economy: Uruguay 1882-2010," Working Papers wpdea1506, Department of Applied Economics at Universitat Autonoma of Barcelona.
    8. Iritié, Bi Goli Jean Jacques, 2015. "Economic growth and biodiversity: An overview. Conservation policies in Africa," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 8(2), pages 196-208.
    9. Elkhan Richard Sadik-Zada & Wilhelm Loewenstein, 2020. "Drivers of CO 2 -Emissions in Fossil Fuel Abundant Settings: (Pooled) Mean Group and Nonparametric Panel Analyses," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(15), pages 1-24, August.
    10. Nguyen Van, Phu & Azomahou, Theophile, 2007. "Nonlinearities and heterogeneity in environmental quality: An empirical analysis of deforestation," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(1), pages 291-309, September.
    11. Mouna Ben Abdeljelil & Christophe Rault & Fateh Belaïd, 2023. "Economic growth and pollutant emissions: new panel evidence from the union for the Mediterranean countries," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 56(3), pages 1537-1566, June.
    12. Dinda, Soumyananda & Coondoo, Dipankor & Pal, Manoranjan, 2000. "Air quality and economic growth: an empirical study," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 409-423, September.
    13. Priscilla Massa-Sánchez & Luis Quintana-Romero & Ronny Correa-Quezada & María de la Cruz del Río-Rama, 2020. "Empirical Evidence in Ecuador between Economic Growth and Environmental Deterioration," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-20, January.
    14. Chris Jeffords & Alexi Thompson, 2016. "An empirical analysis of fatal crimes against environmental and land activists," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 36(2), pages 827-842.
    15. Quan-Hoang Vuong & Manh-Tung Ho & Hong-Kong To Nguyen & Minh-Hoang Nguyen, 2019. "The trilemma of sustainable industrial growth: evidence from a piloting OECD’s Green city," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 5(1), pages 1-14, December.
    16. Sinha, Avik & Bhattacharya, Joysankar, 2016. "Environmental Kuznets curve estimation for NO2 emission: A case of Indian cities," MPRA Paper 100179, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2016.
    17. Omar Alaeddin & Fekri Ali Shawtari & Milad Abdelnabi Salem & Rana Altounjy, 2019. "The Effect of Management Accounting Systems in Influencing Environmental Uncertainty, Energy Efficiency and Environmental Performance," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 9(5), pages 346-352.
    18. Halkos, George, 2011. "Economy - environment relationship: The case of sulphur emissions," MPRA Paper 45480, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Jie HE, 2005. "Economic Determinants for China’s Industrial SO2 Emission: Reduced vs. Structural form and the role of international trade," Working Papers 200505, CERDI.
    20. Veli Yilanci & Recep Ulucak & Yaoqi Zhang & Valeria Andreoni, 2023. "The role of affluence, urbanization, and human capital for sustainable forest management in China: Robust findings from a new method of Fourier cointegration," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(2), pages 812-824, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Google Trends; Deforestation; Environmental Kuznets Curve; Invasive species; Climate change; Pollution;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General
    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:lsprsc:v:12:y:2019:i:2:d:10.1007_s12076-019-00231-3. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.