IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/6707.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Is Free Trade Good for the Environment?

Author

Listed:
  • Werner Antweiler
  • Brian R. Copeland
  • M. Scott Taylor

Abstract

This paper sets out a theory of how openness to international goods markets affects pollution concentrations. We develop a theoretical model to divide trade's impact on pollution into scale, technique, and composition effects and then examine this theory using data on sulfur dioxide concentrations when it alters the composition, and hence the pollution intensity, of national output. Our estimates of the associated technique and scale efforts created by trade imply a net reduction in pollution from these sources. Combining our estimates of scale, composition, and technique efforts yields a somewhat surprising conclusion: freer trade appears to be good for the environment.

Suggested Citation

  • Werner Antweiler & Brian R. Copeland & M. Scott Taylor, 1998. "Is Free Trade Good for the Environment?," NBER Working Papers 6707, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:6707
    Note: ITI
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w6707.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    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. Selden Thomas M. & Song Daqing, 1994. "Environmental Quality and Development: Is There a Kuznets Curve for Air Pollution Emissions?," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 147-162, September.
    3. Adam B. Jaffe et al., 1995. "Environmental Regulation and the Competitiveness of U.S. Manufacturing: What Does the Evidence Tell Us?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 33(1), pages 132-163, March.
    4. Gene M. Grossman & Alan B. Krueger, 1995. "Economic Growth and the Environment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 110(2), pages 353-377.
    5. Kenneth Y. Chay & Michael Greenstone, 2003. "The Impact of Air Pollution on Infant Mortality: Evidence from Geographic Variation in Pollution Shocks Induced by a Recession," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 118(3), pages 1121-1167.
    6. Gale, Lewis R. & Mendez, Jose A., 1998. "The empirical relationship between trade, growth and the environment," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 53-61.
    7. McGuire, Martin C., 1982. "Regulation, factor rewards, and international trade," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(3), pages 335-354, April.
    8. Moulton, Brent R, 1987. "Diagnostics for Group Effects in Regression Analysis," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 5(2), pages 275-282, April.
    9. Jose Mendez & Lewis Gale, "undated". "A Note on the Empirical Relationship Between Trade, Growth and the Environment," Working Papers 2132836, Department of Economics, W. P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University.
    10. Copeland, Brian R & Taylor, M Scott, 1995. "Trade and Transboundary Pollution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(4), pages 716-737, September.
    11. Jeffrey D. Sachs & Andrew Warner, 1995. "Economic Reform and the Process of Global Integration," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 26(1, 25th A), pages 1-118.
    12. Werner Antweiler & Brian R. Copeland & M. Scott Taylor, 2001. "Is Free Trade Good for the Environment?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(4), pages 877-908, September.
    13. Brian R. Copeland & M. Scott Taylor, 1994. "North-South Trade and the Environment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 109(3), pages 755-787.
    14. Pethig, Rudiger, 1976. "Pollution, welfare, and environmental policy in the theory of Comparative Advantage," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 2(3), pages 160-169, February.
    15. Revesz, Richard L. & Stavins, Robert N., 2007. "Environmental Law," Handbook of Law and Economics, in: A. Mitchell Polinsky & Steven Shavell (ed.), Handbook of Law and Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 8, pages 499-589, Elsevier.
    16. Shafik, Nemat, 1994. "Economic Development and Environmental Quality: An Econometric Analysis," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 46(0), pages 757-773, Supplemen.
    17. James A. Tobey, 1990. "The Effects of Domestic Environmental Policies on Patterns of World Trade: An Empirical Test," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(2), pages 191-209, May.
    18. J. P. Neary (ed.), 1995. "International Trade," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, volume 0, number 575.
    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. Brian R. Copeland & M. Scott Taylor, 2004. "Trade, Growth, and the Environment," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 42(1), pages 7-71, March.
    2. He, Jie, 2010. "What is the role of openness for China's aggregate industrial SO2 emission?: A structural analysis based on the Divisia decomposition method," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(4), pages 868-886, February.
    3. Jeffrey A. Frankel & Andrew K. Rose, 2005. "Is Trade Good or Bad for the Environment? Sorting Out the Causality," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 87(1), pages 85-91, February.
    4. Jayadevappa, Ravishankar & Chhatre, Sumedha, 2000. "International trade and environmental quality: a survey," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 175-194, February.
    5. Cole, Matthew A., 2004. "Trade, the pollution haven hypothesis and the environmental Kuznets curve: examining the linkages," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 71-81, January.
    6. Nordström, Håkan & Vaughan, Scott, 1999. "Trade and the environment," WTO Special Studies, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division, volume 4, number 4.
    7. 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.
    8. Dhimitri Qirjo & Razvan Pascalau, 2019. "The Role of TTIP on the Environment," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 85(4), pages 1262-1285, April.
    9. Linda Kleemann & Awudu Abdulai, 2013. "The Impact Of Trade And Economic Growth On The Environment: Revisiting The Cross‐Country Evidence," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(2), pages 180-205, March.
    10. Dinda, Soumyananda, 2004. "Environmental Kuznets Curve Hypothesis: A Survey," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 431-455, August.
    11. Martin Gassebner & Michael Lamla & Jan-Egbert Sturm, 2006. "Economic, demographic and political determinants of pollution reassessed," KOF Working papers 06-129, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich.
    12. Jeffrey A. Frankel, 2003. "The Environment and Globalization," NBER Working Papers 10090, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Haixiao Huang, Walter C. Labys, 2002. "Environment and trade: a review of issues and methods," International Journal of Global Environmental Issues, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 2(1/2), pages 100-160.
    14. Awudu Abdulai & Linda Ramcke, 2008. "New Empirical Evidence for the Impact of Trade and Economic Growth on the Environment," DEGIT Conference Papers c013_022, DEGIT, Dynamics, Economic Growth, and International Trade.
    15. M A Cole & R J R Elliott, 2003. "Do Environmental Regulations Influence Trade Patterns? Testing New and Old Trade Theories," Economics Discussion Paper Series 0310, Economics, The University of Manchester.
    16. Matthew A. Cole & Robert J. R. Elliott, 2003. "Do Environmental Regulations Influence Trade Patterns? Testing Old and New Trade Theories," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(8), pages 1163-1186, August.
    17. Svetlana Batrakova & Ronald Davies, 2012. "Is there an environmental benefit to being an exporter? Evidence from firm-level data," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 148(3), pages 449-474, September.
    18. Naegele, Helene & Zaklan, Aleksandar, 2019. "Does the EU ETS cause carbon leakage in European manufacturing?," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 125-147.
    19. Toke Aidt, 2004. "The rise of environmentalism, pollution taxes and intra-industry trade," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 6(1), pages 1-12, January.
    20. Michikazu Kojima & Etsuyo Michida, 2011. "Trade and the Environment," Chapters, in: Masahisa Fujita & Ikuo Kuroiwa & Satoru Kumagai (ed.), The Economics of East Asian Integration, chapter 18, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • F1 - International Economics - - Trade
    • Q00 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - General - - - General

    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:nbr:nberwo:6707. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: . General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    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: (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.