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Environmental Justice: Establishing Causal Relationships

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  • H. Spencer Banzhaf
  • Lala Ma
  • Christopher Timmins

Abstract

The environmental justice literature has found that the poor and people of color are disproportionately exposed to pollution. This literature has sparked a broad activist movement and several policy reforms in the United States and internationally. In this article, we review the literature documenting correlations between pollution and demographics and the history of the related movement, focusing on the United States. We then turn to the potential causal mechanisms behind the observed correlations. Given its focus on causal econometric models, we argue that economics has a comparative advantage in evaluating these mechanisms. We consider (a) profit-maximizing decisions by firms, (b) Tiebout-like utility-maximizing decisions by households in the presence of income disparities, (c) Coasean negotiations between both sides, (d) political economy explanations and governmental failures, and (e) intergenerational transmission of poverty. Proper identification of the causal mechanisms underlying observed disproportionate exposures is critical to the design of effective policy to remedy them.

Suggested Citation

  • H. Spencer Banzhaf & Lala Ma & Christopher Timmins, 2019. "Environmental Justice: Establishing Causal Relationships," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 11(1), pages 377-398, October.
  • Handle: RePEc:anr:reseco:v:11:y:2019:p:377-398
    DOI: 10.1146/annurev-resource-100518-094131
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Lara J. Cushing & Shiwen Li & Benjamin B. Steiger & Joan A. Casey, 2023. "Historical red-lining is associated with fossil fuel power plant siting and present-day inequalities in air pollutant emissions," Nature Energy, Nature, vol. 8(1), pages 52-61, January.
    2. Rüttenauer, Tobias & Best, Henning, 2020. "Perceived Pollution and Residential Sorting in Germany: Income May Not Sort, But it Helps to Escape," SocArXiv wdu2n, Center for Open Science.
    3. Hausman, Catherine & Stolper, Samuel, 2021. "Inequality, information failures, and air pollution," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    4. Vona, Francesco, 2023. "Managing the distributional effects of climate policies: A narrow path to a just transition," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 205(C).
    5. Fan, Wenran & Ji, Yongjie & Zhang, Wendong, 2022. "Recreational benefit disparity? Evidence from underrepresented population in Iowa," 2022 Annual Meeting, July 31-August 2, Anaheim, California 322536, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    6. Nicholas Kacher, 2023. "Environmental Justice and Resiliency in an Age of Uncertainty ed. by Celeste Murphy‐Greene, 2023, 166 pp., $136.00 (hardcover); $39.16 (ebook); $39.16 (paper). ISBN 9781032024493," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 42(4), pages 1140-1142, September.
    7. Peter Preisendörfer & Heidi Bruderer Enzler & Andreas Diekmann & Jörg Hartmann & Karin Kurz & Ulf Liebe, 2022. "Pathways to Environmental Inequality: How Urban Traffic Noise Annoyance Varies across Socioeconomic Subgroups," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(22), pages 1-18, November.
    8. Kay Jowers & Christopher Timmins & Nrupen Bhavsar & Qihui Hu & Julia Marshall, 2021. "Housing Precarity & the COVID-19 Pandemic: Impacts of Utility Disconnection and Eviction Moratoria on Infections and Deaths Across US Counties," NBER Working Papers 28394, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Zhang, Ruohao & Li, Huan & Khanna, Neha, 2021. "Environmental justice and the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from New York State," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    10. Rüttenauer, Tobias & Best, Henning, 2021. "Consistent Inequality across Germany? Exploring Spatial Heterogeneity in the Unequal Distribution of Air Pollution," SocArXiv 5tavs, Center for Open Science.
    11. Tihitina Andarge & Yongjie Ji & Bonnie L. Keeler & David A. Keiser & Conor McKenzie, 2023. "Environmental Justice and the Clean Water Act: Implications for Economic Analyses of Clean Water Regulations," NBER Chapters, in: Environmental and Energy Policy and the Economy, volume 5, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Claire Conzelmann & Jeremy Hoffman & Toan Phan & Arianna Salazar-Miranda, 2022. "Long-term Effects of Redlining on Environmental Risk Exposure," Working Paper 22-09R, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond.
    13. Li, Liqing, 2023. "Environmental goods provision and gentrification: Evidence from MillionTreesNYC," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    14. Timmins, Christopher & Vissing, Ashley, 2022. "Environmental justice and Coasian bargaining: The role of race, ethnicity, and income in lease negotiations for shale gas," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 114(C).
    15. Bing Yang Tan, 2022. "Save a Tree and Save a Life: Estimating the Health Benefits of Urban Forests," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 82(3), pages 657-680, July.
    16. Sun, Zhongxiao & Behrens, Paul & Tukker, Arnold & Bruckner, Martin & Scherer, Laura, 2022. "Shared and environmentally just responsibility for global biodiversity loss," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).

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