Abstract
Recently, the potential role of social indicators in environmental degradation gets immense attention. Environmental degradation and income inequality are two of the hot topics of debate that anticipate urgent solution. However, income inequality-CO2 emissions nexus has been little investigated in the literature. This study explores the relationship between income inequality and carbon dioxide emission by incorporating globalization and human capital as the determinants of this relationship. The study deploys an innovative technique of dynamic auto-regressive distributive lag simulation to evaluate data covering the period 1980–2015. Findings indicate that unequal distribution of wealth negatively affects carbon emissions. Likewise, the results show that globalization and human capital contribute to environmental degradation. The inclusion of transmission variables validates findings of the study. Policy strategies toward better income distribution and positive externalities of globalization are suggested for sustainability transitions.
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Abbreviations
- ARDL:
-
auto-regressive distributive lag
- CUSUM:
-
cumulative sum
- DARDL:
-
dynamic auto regressive distributive lag
- DF-GLS:
-
Dickey-Fuller generalized least square
- EKC:
-
environmental Kuznets curve
- FDI:
-
foreign direct investment
- FMOLS:
-
fully modified ordinary least square
- GDP:
-
gross domestic product
- GHGs:
-
greenhouse gasses
- MPE:
-
marginal propensity to emit
- PWT:
-
Penn World Table
- STIRPAT:
-
Stochastic Impacts by Regression on Population, Affluence, and Technology
- UNDP:
-
United Nation Development Program
- ZA:
-
Zivot-Andrews
- β:
-
Parameter
- Α:
-
Intercept
- μ:
-
Error term
- ω:
-
Error term
- ∆:
-
Change
- ∑:
-
Summation
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Funding
The study is supported by Guangdong Philosophy and Social Sciences Planning 2021 General Project “Influence Mechanism and Countermeasure of Supply and Demand of Labor Force on Regional Economic Growth in Greater Bay Area of Hong Kong and Macao Study’ Grant (GD21CYJ26).
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Nan Li conceived of the presented idea and developed the theory; Recep Ulucak verified the analytical methods and contributed to the final version of the manuscript; Danish Khan performed the computations and supervised the findings of this work as well.
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Li, N., Ulucak, R. & Danish Turning points for environmental sustainability: the potential role of income inequality, human capital, and globalization. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 40878–40892 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-18223-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-18223-6