Would economic growth affect air pollution in light of the potential transatlantic trade and investment partnership?

摘要

This paper examines the impact of income per capita on five air pollutants, respectively. It employs a dataset of the twenty-eight EU members and of the U.S. over a twenty-five-year period. The results provide robust evidence consistent with the Environmental Kuznets Curve argument for CO2, CH4, and HFCs/PFCs/SF6, respectively. The results yield practically a monotonically increasing relationship between per capita income and per capita emissions of GHGs and N2O, respectively, when including the trade variables related to the possible implementation of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. Thus, this study suggests that policymakers in both sides of the Atlantic could take into consideration that a future trade deal between the U.S. and the EU may contribute to increasing the depletion of the ozone layer.