Economic Policy Uncertainty, Environmental Regulation, and Green Innovation—An Empirical Study Based on Chinese High-Tech Enterprises
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Literature Review and Research Hypothesis
2.1. Literature Review
2.1.1. Environmental Regulation and Green Innovation
2.1.2. Uncertainty of Economic Policy and Enterprise Innovation Activities
2.2. Research Hypothesis
3. Research Design
3.1. Sample Selection and Data Sources
3.2. Data Source
3.3. Variable Definition
3.3.1. Selection of Environmental Regulation Tool Variables
3.3.2. Variable Selection of Enterprise Green Innovation
3.3.3. Moderator Variable
3.3.4. Control Variable
3.4. Model Construction
- Model 1
- Model 2
- Model 3
- Model 4
- Model 5
4. Empirical Results
4.1. Descriptive Statistics
4.2. Empirical Results
4.3. Analysis on the Impact of the Heterogeneity of Environmental Regulation Tools on Enterprise Green Innovation
4.4. Analysis of the Impact of Economic Policy Uncertainty on Enterprises’ Innovation Output
4.4.1. Analysis of the Transmission Mechanism of Economic Policy Uncertainty to Green Innovation
4.4.2. The Adjustment Effect of Economic Policy Uncertainty on the Main Effect
4.4.3. The Lag Effect of Environmental Regulation on Innovation Effect
5. Conclusions
5.1. Suggestion
5.2. Limitation
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Category | Variable Name | Variable Symbol | Index Calculation |
---|---|---|---|
Explained variable | Technological innovation output | GPatent | Granted amount of green invention patents by enterprises |
Explanatory variables | Command-and-control environmental regulations | ER-1 | Number of current effective environmental protection laws and regulations in each region |
Market-incentive environmental regulation | ER-2 | The amount of sewage charges paid into the warehouse/the number of households that have been paid into the warehouse | |
Voluntary environmental regulation | ER-3 | The logarithm of the total environmental letters received and visits in each region | |
Moderator | Economic policy uncertainty | Lnepu | The arithmetic average method is transformed into logarithm of annual data |
Control variable | Marketization index | M-Index | Fan Gang et al. (2016) in the market index system “Overall Score of Marketization Process” |
Return on Assets | ROA | Ratio of total liabilities to total assets | |
Assets and liabilities | LEV | Net profit/total assets | |
Comprehensive tax rate | TAX | (Business taxes and surcharges + income tax expenses)/Total operating income | |
Two jobs in one | Dual | Whether the chairman and general manager are the same person, is it 1, if it is 0 | |
Operating net profit margin | NPM | Net profit/operating income | |
Proportion of independent directors | Indir | Number of independent directors/number of directors | |
Equity checks and balances | S | The sum of the equity ratio of the second largest shareholder to the tenth largest shareholder /the shareholding ratio of the first largest shareholder | |
Management incentives | lnMS | Take the logarithm of the total annual salary of directors, supervisors and senior management |
Variable | Obs | Mean | Std. Dev. | Min | Max | Median |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
GPatent | 3432 | 0.579 | 3.166 | 0 | 65 | 0 |
ER-1 | 3438 | 33.778 | 19.011 | 3 | 105 | 35 |
ER-2 | 3438 | 6.272 | 4.05 | 1.515 | 33.994 | 5.471 |
ER-3 | 3438 | 8.588 | 0.843 | 4.7 | 10.077 | 8.701 |
Lnepu | 3438 | 5.347 | 0.464 | 4.744 | 5.902 | 5.354 |
M-Index | 3438 | 8.313 | 1.578 | 2.87 | 10.29 | 8.89 |
LEV | 3438 | 0.427 | 0.185 | 0.008 | 0.979 | 0.418 |
NPM | 3438 | 0.063 | 0.236 | −8.911 | 2.024 | 0.058 |
TAX | 3438 | 0.024 | 0.03 | −0.316 | 0.774 | 0.019 |
Dual | 3438 | 0.273 | 0.446 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
Indir | 3438 | 0.369 | 0.053 | 0.25 | 0.714 | 0.333 |
S | 3438 | 0.836 | 0.741 | 0.015 | 8.173 | 0.675 |
LnMS | 3438 | 15.304 | 0.685 | 13.045 | 18.772 | 15.258 |
ROA | 3438 | 0.042 | 0.055 | −0.448 | 0.361 | 0.036 |
Variables | (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) |
---|---|---|---|---|
Model 1 | Model 2 | |||
Gpatent | Gpatent | |||
ER-1 | 0.005 | |||
(1.51) | ||||
ER-2 | 0.054 ** | 0.226 ** | ||
(2.47) | (2.34) | |||
ER-22 | −0.007 ** | |||
(−2.21) | ||||
ER-3 | 0.299 * | |||
(1.70) | ||||
M-Index | 0.103 | 0.036 | 0.036 | 0.011 |
(0.58) | (0.20) | (0.19) | (0.06) | |
LEV | 0.135 | 0.140 | 0.125 | 0.202 |
(0.23) | (0.23) | (0.21) | (0.33) | |
TAX | 1.284 | 1.294 | 1.408 | 1.191 |
(0.78) | (0.81) | (0.88) | (0.77) | |
ROA | −2.119 * | −1.896 * | −2.133 * | −1.836 * |
(−1.93) | (−1.73) | (−1.94) | (−1.68) | |
Dual | −0.128 | −0.150 | −0.130 | −0.145 |
(−1.42) | (−1.62) | (−1.43) | (−1.57) | |
NPM | 0.114 | 0.091 | 0.114 | 0.108 |
(1.62) | (1.27) | (1.54) | (1.60) | |
Indir | −0.217 | −0.346 | −0.124 | −0.416 |
(−0.15) | (−0.25) | (−0.09) | (−0.30) | |
S | −0.178 | −0.182 | −0.189 | −0.186 |
(−1.02) | (−1.03) | (−1.07) | (−1.05) | |
LnMS | 0.338 * | 0.284 | 0.314 * | 0.215 |
(1.69) | (1.62) | (1.75) | (1.35) | |
Constant | −5.348 ** | −4.098 ** | −6.855 ** | −3.515 * |
(−2.14) | (−1.98) | (−2.30) | (−1.87) | |
Observations | 3432 | 3432 | 3432 | 3432 |
Number of std | 572 | 572 | 572 | 572 |
R-squared | 0.006 | 0.008 | 0.007 | 0.012 |
Variables | (5) | (6) | (7) |
---|---|---|---|
Model 3 | Model 4 | Model 5 | |
Gpatent | Gpatent | Gpatent | |
ER-2 | 0.217 ** | ||
(2.18) | |||
ER-22 | −0.020 *** | ||
(−2.85) | |||
ER-3 | 1.393 * | ||
(1.78) | |||
lnc | 0.290 *** | 0.056 | 2.100 * |
(3.08) | (0.49) | (1.88) | |
ER-22 × lnc | 0.002 ** | ||
(2.32) | |||
ER-3 × lnc | −0.217 * | ||
(−1.69) | |||
M-Index | −0.010 | −0.017 | −0.016 |
(−0.06) | (−0.10) | (−0.10) | |
LEV | 0.227 | 0.261 | 0.236 |
(0.38) | (0.43) | (0.40) | |
TAX | 0.657 | 0.538 | 0.872 |
(0.45) | (0.36) | (0.58) | |
ROA | −1.959 * | −1.696 | −1.843 * |
(−1.87) | (−1.58) | (−1.76) | |
Dual | −0.123 | −0.142 | −0.129 |
(−1.37) | (−1.55) | (−1.43) | |
NPM | 0.110 | 0.094 | 0.083 |
(1.52) | (1.33) | (1.11) | |
Indir | −0.212 | −0.440 | −0.198 |
(−0.15) | (−0.32) | (−0.14) | |
S | −0.190 | −0.187 | −0.183 |
(−1.06) | (−1.03) | (−1.03) | |
LnMS | 0.268 | 0.184 | 0.248 |
(1.43) | (1.13) | (1.38) | |
Constant | −4.766 ** | −3.011 | −16.086 * |
(−2.04) | (−1.63) | (−1.96) | |
Observations | 3,432 | 3,432 | 3,432 |
Number of std | 572 | 572 | 572 |
R-squared | 0.009 | 0.012 | 0.009 |
Variables | (1) | (2) | (3) |
---|---|---|---|
Model 1 | |||
GPatent_lag | GPatent_lag | GPatent_lag | |
ER1 | 0.007 | ||
(1.21) | |||
ER2 | 0.108 *** | ||
(3.55) | |||
ER3 | 0.390 *** | ||
(2.59) | |||
M-Index | 0.154 | 0.095 | 0.125 |
(1.46) | (0.89) | (1.18) | |
LEV | −0.030 | 0.027 | −0.045 |
(−0.05) | (0.04) | (−0.07) | |
TAX | −0.643 | −1.174 | −0.551 |
(−0.20) | (−0.36) | (−0.17) | |
ROA | 0.354 | 0.916 | 0.479 |
(0.22) | (0.57) | (0.30) | |
Dual | −0.144 | −0.166 | −0.154 |
(−0.78) | (−0.90) | (−0.83) | |
NPM | −0.035 | −0.091 | −0.048 |
(−0.14) | (−0.35) | (−0.18) | |
Indir | −0.306 | −0.518 | −0.210 |
(−0.20) | (−0.34) | (−0.14) | |
S | −0.342 ** | −0.343 ** | −0.354 ** |
(−2.35) | (−2.36) | (−2.43) | |
LnMS | 0.399 ** | 0.283 | 0.379 ** |
(2.28) | (1.59) | (2.16) | |
Constant | −6.506 ** | −4.598 * | −9.071 *** |
(−2.50) | (−1.74) | (−3.26) | |
Observations | 2860 | 2860 | 2860 |
Number of std | 572 | 572 | 572 |
R-squared | 0.008 | 0.013 | 0.010 |
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Zhu, Y.; Sun, Z.; Zhang, S.; Wang, X. Economic Policy Uncertainty, Environmental Regulation, and Green Innovation—An Empirical Study Based on Chinese High-Tech Enterprises. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2021, 18, 9503. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18189503
Zhu Y, Sun Z, Zhang S, Wang X. Economic Policy Uncertainty, Environmental Regulation, and Green Innovation—An Empirical Study Based on Chinese High-Tech Enterprises. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2021; 18(18):9503. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18189503
Chicago/Turabian StyleZhu, Yue, Ziyuan Sun, Shiyu Zhang, and Xiaolin Wang. 2021. "Economic Policy Uncertainty, Environmental Regulation, and Green Innovation—An Empirical Study Based on Chinese High-Tech Enterprises" International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 18, no. 18: 9503. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18189503