Cross-country income disparity and its effect on carbon emissions

摘要

This study is motivated by the interesting relationship between the income Kuznets curve and the carbon Kuznets curve.This paper focuses on the interaction effects of income distribution and income per capita on CO_2 emissions using country group panel data over the period of 1980 to 2006 by employing fixed effects(FE),random effects(RE)and feasible generalized least squares(FGLS)estimation methods.The main findings are as follows.(1)There exists an inverted-U relationship between CO_2 emissions per capita and income per capita in all sample countries and high-income groups.(2)The cross-country income disparity has a negative effect on the average level of CO_2 emissions but a positive effect on the aggregate income elasticity of CO_2 emissions.(3)This negative effect of income disparity on the average level of CO_2emissions decreases along with the growth of per capita income.Thus,economic growth contributes to the reduction of this negative impact.