Skip to main content
Disciplines
Automotive Business IT + Informatics Construction + Real Estate Electrical Engineering + Electronics Energy + Sustainability Insurance + Risk Finance + Banking Management + Leadership Marketing + Sales Mechanical Engineering + Materials
Events
DE
EN
Books
Journals
Topic Page
Marketing
Start single access now
Access for companies
EXTENDED SEARCH
Log in
Top
Published in:
Read chapter Read first chapter

2017 | OriginalPaper | Chapter

12. Economic Growth as a Cause of Environmental Degradation: The Australian Experience

Author : Imad A. Moosa

Published in: Towards A Common Future

Publisher: Springer Singapore

Log in

Activate our intelligent search to find suitable subject content or patents.

search-config
loading …

Abstract

In the presence of more than one scenario on the interaction of growth, environmental regulation and environmental quality, it is unclear what shape is assumed by the relation between environmental degradation and income per capita (that is, the environmental Kuznets curve). Evidence based on Australian data is presented, suggesting that the environmental Kuznets curve EKC is valid for carbon dioxide, in the sense that an inverted U-shaped curve is observed for several measures of CO2 emissions. The results, however, cannot be generalized because the relation between environmental degradation and income per capita is time-varying and country-specific. It also depends on how environmental degradation and income per capita are measured.

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

  • über 102.000 Bücher
  • über 537 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

  • Automobil + Motoren
  • Bauwesen + Immobilien
  • Business IT + Informatik
  • Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
  • Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
  • Finance + Banking
  • Management + Führung
  • Marketing + Vertrieb
  • Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe
  • Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

  • über 67.000 Bücher
  • über 340 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

  • Bauwesen + Immobilien
  • Business IT + Informatik
  • Finance + Banking
  • Management + Führung
  • Marketing + Vertrieb
  • Versicherung + Risiko




Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now
previous chapter The Korean Economy: Creating Space Between China and Japan
next chapter Republic of China’s (Taiwan) Control Yuan As a Participant in Anti-corruption and Integrity-building Initiatives
Appendix
Available only for authorised users
Footnotes
1
Conversely, environmental quality is a U-shaped function of income per capita. The convention is to consider the dependent variable to be environmental degradation (as indicated, for example, by the level of a pollutant) rather than environmental quality.
 
2
The origin of the KEC can be traced back to the original Kuznets curve. At the sixty-seventh annual meeting of the American Economic Association in December 1954, Simon Kuznets delivered a presidential address on economic growth and income inequality. He suggested that rising per capita income is conducive to rising income inequality up to a certain point after which inequality declines with rising income (Kuznets 1955). Kuznets believed that the distribution of income becomes more unequal at early stages of income growth but it eventually moves towards more equality as growth continues. This changing relation between per capita income and income inequality can be represented by an inverted U-shaped curve.
 
3
The demand for environmental quality may rise more than proportionately if the income elasticity of demand for environmental quality is greater than one.
 
4
This argument does not invalidate the EKC if environmental degradation is measured in terms of pollution per capita or per dollar of output.
 
Literature
Anjum, Z., Burke, P. J., Gerlagh, R., & Stern, D. I. (2014). Modeling the Emissions-Income Relationship Using Long-Run Growth Rates (CCEP Working Papers No. 1403). Canberra: The Australian National University.
Beckerman, W. (1992). Economic Growth and the Environment: Whose Growth? Whose Environment? World Development, 20, 481–496.CrossRef
Chow, G. C., & Li, J. (2014). Environmental Kuznets Curve: Conclusive Econometric Evidence for CO2. Pacific Economic Review, 19, 1–7.CrossRef
Daly, H. (1991). Steady-State Economics (2nd ed.). Washington, DC: Island Press.
Dasgupta, S., Laplante, B., Wang, H., & Wheeler, D. (2002). Confronting the Environmental Kuznets Curve. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 16, 147–168.CrossRef
Esty, D. C., & Porter, M. E. (2002). Ranking National Environmental Regulation and Performance: A Leading Indicator of Future Competitiveness? In World Economic Forum (Ed.), Global Competitiveness Report 2001–2002. New York: Oxford University Press.
Grossman, G. M., & Krueger, A. B. (1991). Environmental Impacts of a North American Free Trade Agreement (NBER Working Papers No. 3914). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
Grossman, G. M., & Krueger, A. B. (1993). Pollution and Growth: What Do We Know? In I. Goldin & L. Winters (Eds.), The Economics of Sustainable Development. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Grossman, G. M., & Krueger, A. B. (1995). Economic Growth and the Environment. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 110, 353–377.CrossRef
Jänicke, M., Binder, M., & Mönch, H. (1997). Dirty Industries: Patterns of Change in Industrial Countries. Environmental and Resource Economics, 9, 467–491.
Kriström, B., & Riera, P. (1996). Is the Income Elasticity of Environmental Improvements Less Than One? Environmental and Resource Economics, 7, 45–55.CrossRef
Kuznets, S. (1955). Economic Growth and Income Inequality. American Economic Review, 49, 1–28.
Lim, J. (1997). Economic Growth and Environment: Some Empirical Evidences from South Korea (Working Paper). Sydney: University of New South Wales, School of Economics.
Lopez, R. (Ed.). (1992). The Environment as a Factor of Production: The Economic Growth and Trade Policy Linkages. Washington, DC: World Bank.
Martinez-Alier, J. (1995). The Environment as a Luxury Good or “Too Poor to Be Green”? Ecological Economics, 13, 1–10.CrossRef
Millimet, D. L., List, J. A., & Stengos, T. (2003). The Environmental Kuznets Curve: Real Progress or Misspecified Models? Review of Economics and Statistics, 85, 1038–1047.CrossRef
Neumayer, E. (2003). Weak Versus Strong Sustainability. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.
Panayotou, T. (1993). Empirical Tests and Policy Analysis of Environmental Degradation at Different Stages of Economic Development (ILO Technology and Employment Programme Working Papers No. WP238). Geneva: International Labour Organization.
Panayotou, T. (1997). Demystifying the Environmental Kuznets Curve: Turning a Black Box into a Policy Tool. Environment and Development Economics, 2, 465–484.CrossRef
Panayotou, T. (2000). Economic Growth and the Environment (CID Working Papers No. 56). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Perman, R., & Stern, D. I. (2003). Evidence from Panel Unit Root and Cointegration Tests that the Environmental Kuznets Curve Does Not Exist. Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 47, 325–347.CrossRef
Selden, T., & Song, D. (1994). Environmental Quality and Development: Is There a Kuznets Curve for Air Pollution Emissions? Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 27, 147–162.CrossRef
Shafik, N., & Bandyopadhyay, S. (1992). Economic Growth and Environmental Quality: Time Series and Cross-Country Evidence, Background Paper for the World Development Report 1992. Washington, DC: The World Bank.
Stern, D. I. (2004). The Rise and Fall of the Environmental Kuznets Curve. World Development, 32, 1419–1439.CrossRef
Stern, D. I. (2010). Between Estimates of the Emissions-Income Elasticity. Ecological Economics, 69, 2173–2182.CrossRef
Stern, D. I. (2014). The Environmental Kuznets Curve: A Primer (Crawford School of Public Policy Working Paper No. 1404). Canberra: The Australian National University.
Suri, V., & Chapman, D. (1998). Economic Growth, Trade and the Energy: Implications for the Environmental Kuznets Curve. Ecological Economics, 25, 195–208.CrossRef
Torras, M., & Boyce, J. K. (1998). Income, Inequality, and Pollution: A Reassessment of the Environmental Kuznets Curve. Ecological Economics, 25, 147–160.CrossRef
Vollebergh, H. R. J., Melenberg, B., & Dijkgraaf, E. (2009). Identifying Reduced-Form Relations with Panel Data: The Case of Pollution and Income. Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 58, 27–42.CrossRef
World Bank. (1992). World Development Report 1992: Development and the Environment. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRef
Zhang, J. (2012, September). Delivering Environmentally Sustainable Economic Growth: The Case of China (Working Paper). New York: Asia Society.
Metadata
Title
Economic Growth as a Cause of Environmental Degradation: The Australian Experience
Author
Imad A. Moosa
Copyright Year
2017
Publisher
Springer Singapore
Book
Towards A Common Future

Print ISBN: 978-981-10-5591-1

Electronic ISBN: 978-981-10-5592-8

Copyright Year: 2017

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-5592-8_12

Premium Partner

    Image Credits