Research On The Impact Of Environmental Regulation On The Quality Of Economic Growth

Since the reform and opening up,China's economy has developed rapidly.However,the early economic growth mode of high consumption,high pollution and high emission brought great pressure to the environment.The period of the fastest economic growth is exactly the period of the most serious environmental pollution and the most prominent stage of the contradiction between the environment and the economy.Although my country has been carrying out ecological environment management and has achieved remarkable results,the situation is still not optimistic,and ecological environmental protection has a long way to go.In October 2017,the 19 th National Congress of the Communist Party of China stated that China's economy has shifted from a stage of rapid growth to a stage of high-quality development,and we must insist on quality first and efficiency first.At the same time,the status of ecological civilization is elevated to the "Millennium Plan" for the sustainable development of the Chinese nation,and the strictest ecological and environmental protection system is advocated to gradually form a green development mode and lifestyle.The 2020 "Government Work Report" did not propose specific targets for annual economic growth due to the global epidemic and the uncertainty of the economic and trade situation,but this also shows that my country has moderately downplayed the growth rate of GDP and put more emphasis on the economy quality.In addition,the "Report" emphasizes the need to improve the effectiveness of ecological environment governance,and emphasize lawful,scientific and precise pollution control.The Fifth Plenary Session of the 19 th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in October 2020 put forward the long-term goal of basically realizing socialist modernization by 2035,involving green production and lifestyle,and fundamental improvement of the ecological environment.This requires the government to strengthen environmental regulation and rationally use multiple regulatory methods to continuously improve environmental quality.Environmental regulation undoubtedly has a positive impact on pollution control and emission reduction,but it may have a negative impact on economic growth.This requires that the negative effects of environmental regulation should be reduced as much as possible to achieve the common development of the two.The impact of environmental regulation on economic growth has not yet formed a unified view,especially on the quality of economic growth.To reveal the specific impact of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth and its various dimensions is of great significance for further improving China's environmental regulation system and promoting high-level ecological environment protection and high-quality economic development.In this context,this paper conducts an in-depth study on the subject of the impact of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth.Firstly,on the basis of reviewing and sorting out relevant domestic and foreign literature,and combining theories of economic growth quality and environmental regulation,this paper defines the connotation of economic growth quality,and analyzes the motivation and goal of environmental regulation by using the supply-demand equilibrium model and optimal regulation policy model of environmental regulation.It also analyzes the impact mechanism of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth from the five dimensions of economic growth efficiency,structure,stability,sustainability and openness.Secondly,combined with the background of economic development and the situation of environmental regulation legislation and institutions,this paper systematically sorts out the historical evolution of my country's environmental regulation and divides it into four stages: the gradual strengthening of environmental regulation in the early stage of reform and opening up(1978-1991),the rapid development of environmental regulation after the establishment of the market economy system(1992-2001),continuous improvement of environmental regulation since the 21 st century(2002-2011)and comprehensive improvement of environmental regulation under the new normal(2012-present).Combined with changes in the economic system,economic growth mode,and the relationship between the environment and the economy,this paper summarizes the main characteristics of environmental regulation,that is,the overall intensity of environmental regulation is increasing,the concept is gradually changing and the mode is more diversified.It also reveals the existing problems of environmental regulation,that is,the conflict of multiple objectives,the asymmetry of regulation methods,the existence of "one size fits all" phenomenon,the overlapping of functions and unclear rights and responsibilities,and the need to strengthen the prevention of environmental risks.Thirdly,this paper constructs an indicator system for economic growth quality,uses the global principal component analysis method to measure the panel data of my country's 30 provinces from 2002 to 2018,and based on the measurement results,the quality of my country's economic growth and its five dimensions are dynamically compared and analyzed in time and space from the provincial,regional and national levels.Then,the dynamic panel regression model is constructed to test the impact of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth and its five dimensions of efficiency,structure,stability,sustainability and openness,and to test the robustness and regional heterogeneity.Finally,this paper summarizes the research results of the full text,and from breaking the dilemma of environmental regulation,realizing multi governance,innovating the mode of environmental regulation,optimizing the mechanism of marketization and public participation,prohibiting "one size fits all" policy,exploring differentiated regulation,clarifying environmental responsibility,standardizing power operation,improving risk early warning ability and building an intelligent environmental regulation system put forward corresponding countermeasures and suggestions.The main conclusions are as follows:(1)Generally speaking,the impact of environmental regulation on the quality of my country's economic growth presents an inverted "U" shape.The strengthening of environmental regulation is conducive to the improvement of the quality of economic growth,but excessive regulation is not conducive to the improvement of the quality of economic growth.In order to achieve a win-win situation for both,it is necessary to innovate and adjust the way of environmental regulation,and optimize the marketization and public participation mechanism.(2)In terms of dimensions,the impact of environmental regulation on the quality of my country's economic growth is mainly reflected in the three dimensions of efficiency,sustainability and openness.The impact of environmental regulation on the efficiency of economic growth is significantly negative.Although environmental regulation at the efficiency level is conducive to reducing energy consumption per unit of output and increasing energy utilization,the cost effect makes economic growth efficiency drop significantly.The impact of environmental regulation on the sustainability and openness of economic growth all presents an inverted "U" shape.After calculation,environmental regulation is located on the left side of the inflection point,that is,the current environmental regulation has a positive impact on the sustainability and openness of economic growth.In order to meet energy conservation and emission reduction standards under environmental regulation,enterprises increase R&D investment,improve pollution control technology and innovate production mode.The compensation effect of innovation is conducive to improving the sustainability of economic growth.In addition,the appropriate enhancement of environmental regulation will also help improve the export competitiveness of pollution-intensive industries,which has a positive impact on export trade.However,environmental regulation has no significant impact on the structure and stability of economic growth.(3)Regional heterogeneity exists in the impact of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth and its dimensions.In the eastern region,the strengthening of environmental regulation is not conducive to the improvement of the quality of economic growth,while in the central and western regions,the impact of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth presents an inverted "U" shape.After calculation,environmental regulation is on the left side of the inflection point,that is,the strengthening of environmental regulation is conducive to the improvement of the quality of economic growth in the central and western regions.The eastern region has a solid foundation for high-quality economic development,coupled with its relatively complete environmental regulation system and high environmental standards.If the intensity of environmental regulation is increased blindly,policy constraints may cause distortions in resource allocation,which is not conducive to the improvement of the quality of economic growth.However,due to the relatively weak economic development foundation in the central and western regions,economic growth is mostly extensive.In particular,the western region has to shoulder the heavy responsibility of industrial transfer in the eastern region to a greater extent,resulting in fragile ecological environment and serious pollution problems.The implementation of environmental regulation can just eliminate backward companies that do not meet the standards,force companies to change their development methods,stimulate innovation power and potential,and have a positive impact on the quality of economic growth.Therefore,it is necessary to formulate and adjust environmental regulation policies and explore differentiated regulation according to the actual situation of each region.The innovations of this paper are as follows.First,perspective innovation.In the analysis of the impact of environmental regulation on economic growth,the existing literatures mostly focus on the quantity of economic growth,and lack of research on the quality dimension of economic growth.Second,method innovation.Although some scholars have studied the impact of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth,they all start from a specific angle such as industrial structure,technological innovation and foreign trade,or take total factor productivity and green total factor productivity as the proxy variables of economic growth quality,which has one sidedness and limitations.If some indicators are selected to comprehensively evaluate the quality of economic growth,most scholars use the classic principal component analysis method.This paper combines time series analysis with principal component analysis,and uses global principal component analysis to calculate the comprehensive index of economic growth quality,which is more comprehensive.In the empirical test,this paper adds the quadratic term of environmental regulation,and considering that the quality of economic growth is gradually adjusted and continuously dynamic,constructs a dynamic panel model to investigate the nonlinear relationship between environmental regulation and the quality of economic growth and its various dimensions,and the regional heterogeneity test is carried out.Third,theoretical innovation.Part of the literature on the impact of environmental regulation on economic growth distinguishes the quantity and quality of economic growth,but lacks in-depth analysis of the quality.This paper breaks through the "following cost theory" and "innovation compensation theory",and deeply analyzes the mechanism of environmental regulation on the quality of economic growth from five dimensions.In addition,this paper also has some shortcomings.Different environmental regulation methods,such as command control,market incentive and public participation,have different effects on the economy.However,this paper has not yet distinguished them in the impact mechanism and empirical test.In the future,I will further collect all kinds of environmental regulation related data for deeper research and expansion.