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Environmental Pollution Index and economic growth: evidence from OECD countries

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Abstract

The increase in economic growth and production has caused some environmental risks. Factors such as global climate changes and global warming have raised awareness against environmental pollution. In this context, the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis, developed to explain the relationship between economic growth and environmental pollution, has become one of the most researched topics in the literature. In this research, the relationship is investigated between economic growth and environmental pollution for 28 OECD countries with data from the period 1995–2015. Initially, the Environmental Pollution Index was calculated using some standardized values. In addition, the relationship is examined between the Environmental Pollution Index, per capita income, environmentally related tax revenues, and urban population using Driscoll-Kraay standard errors and system generalized moments method estimators. According to the study’s findings, there is an inverted U–shaped relationship between the Environmental Pollution Index and per capita income. This result supports the environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis for the OECD countries. This research is aimed to contribute to improving awareness of environmental pollution risk, which has a vital impact on sustainability besides contributing to literature.

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Data availability

The datasets analyzed during the current study are available in the World Bank DataBank and OECD Database repository [https://data.worldbank.org/ , https://data.oecd.org/].

Notes

  1. The list of 28 OECD countries is given in Appendix Table 4.

  2. The CD test results are given in Appendix Table 6

  3. The CIPS statistics and critical values calculated by Pesaran (2007) are given in Appendix Table 7.

  4. The F, LM, and Hausman test results are given in Appendix Table 8.

  5. The fixed effects model and basic assumptions test results are given in Appendix Table 9.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Labour Economics and Industrial Relations, Faculty of Economics, Anadolu University, Eskişehir, Turkey

    Selim Başar

  2. Department of Economics, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Atatürk University, Erzurum, Turkey

    Bengü Tosun

Authors
  1. Selim Başar
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  2. Bengü Tosun
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. BT performed and interpreted material preparation, data collection, and analysis. SB wrote the first draft of the manuscript and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Selim Başar.

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Responsible Editor: Ilhan Ozturk

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Appendices

Appendices

Table 4. List of OECD countries used in the analysis
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Table 5. Descriptive statistics
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Table 6 CD test results
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Table 7 The CADF test results
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Table 8 F, LM, and Hausman test results
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Table 9 The fixed effects model and basic assumption tests results
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Başar, S., Tosun, B. Environmental Pollution Index and economic growth: evidence from OECD countries. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 36870–36879 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-13225-w

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